Israel plans to seize parts of Gaza and stay indefinitely

JERUSALEM — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet voted unanimously Sunday night to begin seizing and holding swaths of Gaza, clarifying a decision about a new direction in military strategy but sharpening the looming, unresolved question of whether Israel is inching toward the long-term reoccupation of the Gaza Strip. The newly authorized plan, which requires tens of thousands of reservists to be called up in the coming weeks, would see the Israel Defense Forces gradually enter tracts of northern and southern Gaza and stay there indefinitely, Israeli officials said Monday. Civilians in those areas would be evacuated to other areas secured by the IDF, while Israeli forces would remain long-term to root out Hamas fighters and destroy their tunnels. But Netanyahu’s powerful finance minister, the settler leader Bezalel Smotrich, said there would be no turning back even if Hamas returned hostages. There will be “no retreat from the territories we have conquered, not even in exchange for hostages,” he told a conference Monday.