Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he has instructed the military to expand Israel's control over the Gaza Strip to 70 percent of the territory, sharpening disputes over ceasefire lines and the broader course of the war.
Netanyahu announced the new target at an event in an Israeli settlement in the occupied West Bank, saying Israeli forces currently control around 60 percent of Gaza. He described the push to 70 percent as a staged advance and presented it as the next concrete objective for the army on the ground.
The declared goal goes beyond the so‑called "Yellow Line," an interim armistice line drawn under a ceasefire plan that took effect in October 2025 and was meant to define where Israeli troops would pull back inside Gaza, according to CNN.
Marked on official maps, the Yellow Line effectively split the enclave, with Israeli forces remaining east of the line and a nominally demilitarized area to its west, but Netanyahu's 70 percent target would extend control well past that demarcation.
Under the Gaza ceasefire and hostage‑exchange agreement approved by Israel's government in October 2025, the military was to withdraw to positions along the Yellow Line within 24 hours of the truce taking effect, halt offensive operations, and allow a major increase in aid deliveries.
Hamas and allied groups were required to stop rocket fire, release hostages in phased exchanges, and accept international monitoring mechanisms linked to prisoner releases and reconstruction funding, Reuters reported.
Since then, monitoring organizations and humanitarian agencies say Israel has repeatedly violated the ceasefire through ongoing airstrikes, ground incursions, and the quiet extension of military zones beyond the Yellow Line.
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New operational maps shared with aid groups show an "orange line" and expanded restricted belts that push Israeli control further west, leaving civilians caught in shifting areas of risk and limiting access to assistance.
Palestinian factions in Gaza say their missile and rocket fire toward Israel is a response to continued Israeli airstrikes, civilian casualties, and what they describe as violations of the ceasefire.
Hamas has also framed launches as efforts to deter deeper Israeli ground operations and to signal that Israel cannot entrench long‑term control in northern Gaza without facing armed resistance.
The current war began on 7 October 2023, when Hamas and allied armed groups carried out a large‑scale assault on southern Israel, firing thousands of rockets, breaching the border, and attacking nearby communities, killing about 1,200 people and taking around 250 hostages.
Israel responded with massive airstrikes and a ground invasion of Gaza, vowing to destroy Hamas's military capabilities and remove it from power in the enclave, as per The Guardian.
Health authorities in Gaza now report that more than 72,000 Palestinians have been killed and over 172,000 injured since October 2023, with hundreds more deaths recorded even after the October 2025 ceasefire formally took effect.
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