Under the proposed plan, seen by the Associated Press, civilians who remain in northern Gaza would be classified as combatants, allowing Israeli troops to kill them. They would be denied access to food, water, medicine, and fuel.
The plan proposed to Netanyahu by a group of retired generals, calls for Israel to maintain control over the north for an indefinite period to attempt to create a new administration, splitting the Gaza Strip in two.
Israeli media reported that Netanyahu told a closed parliamentary committee session that he was considering the plan.
Israeli authorities with knowledge of the matter said parts of the plan are already being implemented.
The plan gave Palestinians a week to leave the northern third of the Gaza Strip, including Gaza City, before declaring it a closed military zone.
Israel has issued many evacuation orders for the north throughout the yearlong campaign of death and destruction, the most recent of which was Sunday.
Israeli troops widened their brutal military offensive on north Gaza early on Sunday, after killing 300 people over tens days in a ramped-up ground offensive targeting the Jabalia refugee camp.
Israeli tanks made their way to the north edge of Gaza City, while airstrikes from above continued.
Residents say they have been isolated from the rest of the besieged enclave, with Israeli forces not allowing anyone to enter or exit the north.
No trucks of food, water, or medicine have entered the north since Sept. 30, according to the UN.
So far, very few Palestinians have heeded the latest evacuation order. Much fear there’s nowhere safe to go and that they will never be allowed back. Israel has prevented those who fled earlier in the war from returning.
Philippe Lazzarini, head of the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees, wrote on X Thursday that at least 400,000 people are trapped in the area.
“With almost no basic supplies available, hunger is spreading.”
Human rights groups say the plan would likely starve civilians and that it flies in the face of international law, which prohibits using food as a weapon and forcible transfers.
The fact that Israel is intentionally limiting food to Gaza is central to the genocide case brought against it at the International Court of Justice.
Israeli authorities say that if the strategy is successful in northern Gaza it could then be replicated in other areas, including tent camps further to the south sheltering hundreds of thousands of Palestinians.
The Israeli military presses ahead with its relentless bombardment of the blockaded territory now more than one year into the genocidal war.
The Israeli aggression on Gaza began in October last year, claiming the lives of more than 42,000 so far. Over 98,000 d others have also been injured since then.
A senior Palestinian diplomat to the United Nations has sounded alarm over Israel’s ongoing siege of northern Gaza, in which hundreds of Palestinians have been killed over the last week and hundreds of thousands of civilian residents are either trapped or ordered to flee amid intense bombardment.
“What is happening in northern Gaza now is a genocide within the genocide,” Palestinian Ambassador Majed Bamya, the deputy permanent observer to the UN, wrote on X.
