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Israel minister calls for targeting Hamas leaders

May 16, 2018 at 11:32 am

The Israeli government should resume its policy of targeting Hamas leaders in an effort to stop the protests in the Gaza Strip, Israeli Minister of Public Security, Gilad Erdan, said yesterday.

“It’s time for the heads of Hamas to pay a personal price for organising these terror attacks,” Erdan said in an interview with Israel’s Yedioth Ahronoth.

Referring to the Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar and others who recently announced their intention to take part in the Palestinian protests at the Gaza border as well as their will to be killed near the border fence, the Israeli minister responded: “Let them.”

We need to go back to targeted killings, and they need to go back to hiding underground and fearing for their lives, not organising the masses to carry out terror attacks.

The minister pointed out that the Israeli political ranks “are not yet managing, on a tactical level, all of the military operations,” stressing that his proposal to resume assassinations against Hamas leaders “hasn’t been discussed yet”.

“I’m not representing anyone else’s position, these are my own views,” he said.

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He also warned of the Israeli forces’ plan to “prepare for a record day in the protests and clashes that Hamas is trying to create on the border.”

Some 63 Palestinians have now been killed by Israeli occupation forces over the past two days along the Gaza-Israel border. The protests against the opening of the US’ embassy in occupied Jerusalem and to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Nakba have led to thousands being injured, scores with live fire.