May 29, 2026 9:46 AM

Netanyahu directs Israeli forces to expand Gaza control to 70 percent 

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday he had directed Israel's military to take more of Gaza, initially by seizing 70% of the Palestinian territory, where the population is already penned into a tiny strip of land along the coast. Israel effectively controls an estimated 64% of the tiny coastal Strip, bombarded to ruins by Israel's two-year military assault that followed the 2023 Hamas attack on southern Israel. Under an October U.S.-brokered truce that has failed to halt Israeli ...