This comes after a similar warning from the UAE, which stated that any annexation would be a red flag that could lead his country to exit the Abraham Accords.
The report also specified how Saudi Arabia’s endgame goal seems to be the recognition of a Palestinian state and a two-state solution to the conflict.
Hamas is keeping 8 to 10 living hostages in Gaza City and is not planning to kill them, since they serve as the terror group’s “strongest bargaining chip,” Israel HaYom reports.
Between eight and ten Israeli hostages are believed to be alive in Gaza City as the IDF expands operations there, according to a video released by the Hamas terrorist group showing hostage Guy Gilboa-Dalal.
Dalal, who said he was filmed on August 28 in Gaza City, appeared alongside fellow hostage Alon Ohel.
Hamas had previously threatened to move hostages into Gaza City in an effort to slow Israel’s advance.
Israeli defense officials, however, assess that the terrorist organization is unlikely to put the captives at risk, since the hostages are considered “its strongest bargaining chip.”
Families of hostages have voiced growing concern in recent weeks about the dangers their loved ones face as the military campaign intensifies inside the city.
Anat Angrest, the mother of hostage Matan, said in a post on X that she was told during a phone call her son’s life is in immediate peril.
Directing her words to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, she wrote: “Prime Minister, did you sleep last night? Because I’ve just passed my 700th sleepless night.”
“They told me yesterday on the phone that my Matan is in immediate mortal danger. That’s why tonight, I will come to your doorstep along with tens of thousands of Israeli citizens. It will be loud—just like it is loud for Matan, surrounded by the echoes of explosions. You will not have more peace than I do. That time is over.”
IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir has reportedly assured hostage families that their loved ones remain on his mind as the army pushes ahead with its offensive in Gaza City, despite warnings from military officials that the campaign could endanger the captives.
According to Channel 12, Zamir has privately urged Netanyahu to set aside the Gaza City operation in favor of a ceasefire agreement that would secure the hostages’ release.
Meeting recently with families, he said: “The operation will be conducted by me, with responsibility toward the troops and the hostages.”
Israeli annexation discussions ‘wholly predictable,’ says top US diplomat, suggesting Western countries walked into trap with planned announcements that won’t actually create Palestinian state
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Thursday criticized Western countries moving to recognize a Palestinian state, saying he warned them that Israel may respond by annexing the West Bank.
Rubio declined to join the global condemnation of efforts by members of the Israeli government to annex the West Bank in hopes of ending prospects of an independent Palestinian state.
“What you’re seeing with the West Bank and the annexation, that’s not a final thing — that’s something being discussed among some elements of Israeli politics. I’m not going to opine on that today,” Rubio told reporters in Ecuador.
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“We told all these countries before they went out and they did this… There wasn’t going to be a Palestinian state, because that’s not the way a Palestinian state is going to happen, because they have a press conference somewhere.
“We told them that it would lead to these sorts of reciprocal actions and it would make a ceasefire [in Gaza] harder,” Rubio said.
He also repeated his charge that the push to elevate the Palestinian Authority, which is based in the West Bank, emboldened rival Hamas in Gaza.
“The minute — the day — that the French announced the thing they did, that day, Hamas walked away from the negotiating table,” Rubio said.
Arab diplomats have disputed this to The Times of Israel, explaining that Hamas had submitted a position that day — which was rejected by Israel and the US — several hours before the declaration out of Paris.
French President Emmanuel Macron has called a UN summit for September 22, where he will recognize a Palestinian state, voicing exasperation at the dire humanitarian situation in the Strip and what he sees as Israeli intransigence.
On Wednesday, Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich called for annexation of swaths of the West Bank, intending to “bury the idea of a Palestinian state” after countries including Belgium, Canada and Australia joined the French push on statehood.
The United Arab Emirates — which took the landmark step of normalizing relations with Israel in 2020 in the so-called Abraham Accords — quickly warned that annexation was a “red line” that would “severely undermine” the agreement, seen by both US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a legacy-defining achievement.
Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar on Thursday urged his French counterpart to withdraw Paris’s planned unilateral recognition of Palestinian statehood this month, telling him that Macron will not be welcome to visit Israel so long as the move remains on the agenda.
In a phone call, Israel’s top diplomat called on French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot “to reconsider France’s initiative to recognize a ‘Palestinian state,’ stating that the French initiative undermines stability in the Middle East and harms Israel’s national and security interests,” according to a statement from Sa’ar’s office.
“Israel seeks good relations with France, but France must respect Israel’s position when it comes to matters essential to its security and future,” Sa’ar stressed during the conversation.
On Wednesday night, Kan news reported that Netanyahu conditioned a request for a visit by Macron, on France scrapping the recognition initiative, a demand the French president rejected.
Israel has been under mounting pressure to wrap up its campaign in Gaza, where the war — which began with the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, massacre in southern communities — has created a humanitarian crisis and devastated much of the territory.
Amid the mounting criticism, Macron announced that France would formally recognize a Palestinian state during a UN meeting in September. Many Western nations have followed in Paris’s footsteps.
Netanyahu told “Abu Ali Express,” a popular account on the Telegram messaging app, during an interview on Thursday, that such moves contradicted agreements between Israel and the Palestinian Liberation Organization, which determined that disputed issues would be solved through negotiation.
“But if they take unilateral steps against us, don’t be surprised if we take unilateral steps as well. What we will do exactly, I won’t reveal here,” he said.
Nava Frieiberg contributed to this report.
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