TEL AVIV - The Israeli government is moving quickly to annihilate the Gaza Strip, Israeli Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu said Thursday, saying the entire Strip will then be Jewish-only. The minister told Kol Barama radio station, according to The Times of Israel (ToI). His remarks were rejected by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and condemned by the Israeli opposition.

"There is no hunger in Gaza," Elijah said. "But we don't have to deal with hunger in the Strip. Let the world worry about that," he added. Meanwhile, the UN, humanitarian organizations and many Western governments have warned of the already existing malnutrition and starvation risks in the Gaza Strip.

According to Prime Minister Netanyahu, the minister does not speak for the government and is not a member of the security cabinet that decides on the conduct of the war. The Prime Minister's Office said this on the social network X.

"Minister Eliyahu's words are an attack on values and a propaganda disaster," opposition leader Jair Lapid wrote on the X network, calling the current government an extremist government with ministers invoking blood and death. According to Lapid, Israeli soldiers do not fight and die to exterminate the civilian population.

In November 2023, Eliyahu said the atomic bomb could solve the Gaza problem. He said of the inhabitants of the Strip's territories that "they can drag them to the desert, for example."

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