• Israeli minister demands expansion to Gaza’s yellow line, Litani River; suggests repeat of Gaza war in occupied West Bank
• Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority condemns remarks as a push for escalation, displacement
• Israel delays West Bank settlement tender until after election
JERUSALEM: Israel’s far-right finance minister on Sunday called for the annexation of parts of the Gaza Strip and south Lebanon, and for forces to “go to war” in the West Bank, as the country’s attorney general delayed a contentious settlement scheme ahead of elections next month.
“I would like us to annex at least as far as the yellow line in Gaza and as far as the Litani River in Lebanon, because if a war ends along the same lines where it began, what will deter the enemy from going to war again?” Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said in a podcast for the Israeli news site Ynet.
The “yellow line” demarcates the area of the Gaza Strip already under Israeli military control.
“I think we need to go to war in Judea and Samaria, to do there what we did in Gaza, to dismantle the Palestinian Authority, which is a terror authority,” Smotrich added, using the biblical term for the West Bank.
Smotrich leads a far-right party advocating the annexation of the entire West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967. Political leaders across Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ruling right-wing coalition and the opposition oppose the establishment of a Palestinian state.
The Palestinian Authority condemned Smotrich’s call for war on Sunday.
“His statements are an explicit call for escalation, annexation and displacement, aimed at undermining the prospects of an independent Palestinian state,” the Ramallah-based authority said in a statement.
The comments came as Israel’s attorney general, Gali Baharav-Miara, moved to postpone construction bids for the E1 settlement project, which would drive a wedge through the occupied West Bank and further cut off East Jerusalem, annexed by Israel, from the rest of the territory.
The scheme was approved last year after years on hold under pressure from Washington.
Baharav-Miara’s office said the tender deadline would be pushed back by a month so that it would fall after election day, in order to “reduce concern over the tender being used for election propaganda”.
Israel’s housing ministry had opened the tender for more than 1,200 housing units in July; it had been due to close on October 19.
Smotrich, also a leader of the settler movement, condemned the delay. In a video posted on X, he accused Baharav-Miara of “interfering in the election campaign” and “working for Gadi Eisenkot”, Netanyahu’s main rival for the premiership.
Guy Yifrach, mayor of the Maale Adumim settlement, which is expected to expand into the E1 zone, petitioned Israel’s Supreme Court against the postponement, arguing it was political. “We have waited more than 30 years for E1,” Yifrach said in a statement.
Six European countries, including the UK and France, called on Israel to halt the project in August.
Published in Dawn, September 28th, 2026
