Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that Israel’s position in the Middle East has forced it into becoming a key-factor in blocking the spread of radical Islam, which is led by the Sunni-Muslim Islamic State and the Shi’ite Muslim Islamic Republic of Iran. During the Israeli government’s weekly cabinet meeting, Netanyahu further asserted that Israel’s role in combating the threat of radical Islamic does not only serve the security interests of the Jewish state, but also takes into account the security of other nations around the world that face those same challenges. PM Netanyahu said, “By being here, we constitute the key factor in the Middle East that blocks the spread of radical Islam, led by Iran and the Islamic State, and these are also threatening all other elements across the world. We are no interested in war, but we will do everything necessary to defend ourselves,” the Israeli leader asserted during his government’s weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem.
U.S. President Donald Trump’s special representative for international negotiations Jason Greenblatt accused the Islamic Republic of Iran of spending almost a billion dollars a year in “sponsoring terrorism in Lebanon, Israel, the West Bank and Gaza.” In a statement the American envoy made on his Twitter account, Greenblatt warned that “This blood money only increases violence and does nothing to help the Palestinian people.” Trump’s Middle East envoy also condemned in a statement the Islamist Hamas organization over the dire humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip. In a twitter post on the matter, the American envoy stressed that “Hamas should be improving the lives of those it purports to govern, but instead chooses to increase violence and cause misery for the civilian population of Gaza.” Envoy Greenblatt further noted “Imagine what the people of Gaza could do with the 100 million dollars (that) Iran gives Hamas annually that Hamas uses for weapons and tunnels to attack Israel!”
Meanwhile, Israeli officials believe that Hamas has been making the crisis in Gaza worse intentionally so that Israel would pressure Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas to pay the salaries of public officials in the Hamas-run territory. Israeli security officials voiced concern to TV7 regarding Hamas’s policy, which they warned is liable to spiral out-of-control as a result of the deteriorating situation across the Palestinian enclave. Among the main challenges Gaza faces, the unemployment rate among young people living in the Hamas-run territory has reached 60% and about 90% of the water sources in Gaza are not drinkable.