DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday that Israel is establishing a new security corridor across the Gaza Strip to pressure Hamas, suggesting it would cut off the southern city of Rafah, which Israel has ordered evacuated, from the rest of the Palestinian territory.
The announcement came after Netanyahu’s defense minister said that Israel would seize large areas of Gaza and add them to its security zones.
Israel has vowed to escalate the nearly 18-month war with Hamas until the terrorist group returns dozens of remaining hostages, disarms and leaves the territory. Israel ended a ceasefire in March and has imposed a monthlong halt on all imports of food, fuel and humanitarian aid.
Netanyahu described the new axis as the Morag corridor, using the name of a Jewish settlement that once stood between Rafah and Khan Younis, suggesting it would run between the two southern cities. He said it would be “a second Philadelphi corridor ” referring to the Gaza side of the border with Egypt further south, which has been under Israeli control since last May.
Israel has reasserted control over the Netzarim corridor, also named for a former settlement, that cuts off the northern third of Gaza, including Gaza City, from the rest of the narrow coastal strip. Both of the existing corridors run from the Israeli border to the Mediterranean Sea.
“We are cutting up the strip, and we are increasing the pressure step by step, so that they will give us our hostages,” Netanyahu said.
In northern Gaza, an Israeli airstrike hit a U.N. building in the built-up Jabaliya refugee camp, killing 15 people, according to the Indonesian Hospital. The Israeli military said it struck Hamas terrorists in a command and control center.
More than 60 percent of Gaza is now considered a “no-go” zone because of Israeli evacuation orders, according to Olga Cherevko, a spokesperson for the U.N. humanitarian aid office.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz had earlier said Israel would seize “large areas” and add them to its security zones, apparently referring to an existing buffer zone along Gaza’s entire perimeter. He called on Gaza residents to “expel Hamas and return all the hostages,” saying “this is the only way to end the war.”
On Sunday, Netanyahu said Israel plans to maintain overall security control of Gaza after the war and implement President Donald Trump’s proposal to resettle much of its population elsewhere through what the Israeli leader referred to as “voluntary emigration.”
Hamas has said it will only release the remaining 59 hostages — 24 of whom are believed to be alive — in exchange for the release of more Palestinian prisoners, a lasting ceasefire and an Israeli pullout. The group has rejected demands that it lay down its arms or leave the territory.
The decision to resume the war has fueled protests in Israel, where many fear it has put the hostages at grave risk and are calling for another ceasefire and exchange with Hamas.
In addition to the 15 killed in northern Gaza, Israeli airstrikes overnight into Wednesday killed another 28 people across the territory, according to local hospitals.
Israel says it targets only terrorists and makes every effort to spare civilians, blaming Hamas for their deaths because the terrorists operate in densely populated areas.
Two projectiles were fired out of Gaza late Wednesday and intercepted, the Israeli military said. There were no reports of casualties or damage.
The war began when Hamas-led terrorists attacked southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking 251 hostages, most of whom have since been released in ceasefire agreements and other deals. Israel rescued eight living hostages and has recovered dozens of bodies.
Israel’s offensive has killed more than 50,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run Health Ministry, which doesn’t say whether those killed are civilians or combatants. Israel says it has killed around 20,000 terrorists.
