File photo taken on Nov. 18, 2023 shows Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (left), Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant (center), former Israeli Defense Minister and leader of the National Unity Party Benny Gantz at a press conference in Tel Aviv, Israel. Israeli media reported on June 17, 2024 that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the security cabinet Sunday night that the war cabinet, which was created on Oct. 11, has been officially disbanded. Xinhua
JERUSALEM – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has dissolved his wartime cabinet, which was created on Oct. 11, 2023, an Israeli government official confirmed to Xinhua.
The wartime cabinet was established days after the beginning of Israel's conflict with Hamas in the Gaza Strip, in order to discuss Israel's operations in the enclave and along the northern border against the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah, a Hamas ally in the region.
Netanyahu announced the decision during a security cabinet meeting on Sunday, according to the official.
The disbanding of the wartime cabinet came as Itamar Ben-Gvir, a right-wing extremist minister of internal security, demanded to join it. His request came following the resignation of Benny Gantz, leader of the only centrist party in Netanyahu's coalition government, on June 9.
The wartime cabinet consisted of three members - Netanyahu, Gantz, and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who together made important decisions regarding the military campaign in Gaza.
The Israeli army continued its assault on the Gaza Strip on the second day of Muslims' major festival Eid al-Adha on Monday, killing a Palestinian child and an elderly man and injuring several others in an airstrike on a home.
The Palestinian Civil Defense said in a statement that its rescue teams "removed two martyrs, a child and an elderly," as well as several injured people, from the rubble of the Muqat family home in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood of Gaza City.
Despite the Eid al-Adha celebrations, Israeli attacks on Gaza continue, preventing people from meeting and greeting, instead focusing on collecting bodies and injured loved ones, with some searching for them under the rubble of destroyed homes.
Israel has faced international condemnation amid its continued brutal offensive on Gaza since an Oct. 7, 2023 attack by Hamas despite a UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate cease-fire.
More than 37,300 Palestinians have since been killed in Gaza, most of them women and children, and more than 85,000 others injured, according to local health authorities.
Over eight months into the Israeli war, vast tracts of Gaza lay in ruins amid a crippling blockade of food, clean water, and medicine.
Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, whose latest ruling ordered Tel Aviv to immediately halt its operation in Rafah, where over a million Palestinians had sought refuge from the war before it was invaded on May 6. XInhua and Anadolu
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