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Israel’s Gaza City Offensive May Be Weeks Away, Leaving Time for Potential Ceasefire
Palestinians look at aid packages that are airdropped over Gaza, in Gaza City, Aug. 8, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Israel’s new offensive in Gaza City could take weeks to start, leaving the door open for a ceasefire, officials say, even as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said it would get underway “fairly quickly” and end the war with Hamas’s defeat.
Two officials who were at a security cabinet meeting on Thursday to approve the plan told Reuters that the evacuation of civilians from affected areas may only be completed by the start of October, giving time for a deal to be pursued.
The plan raised international alarm over the harm it could bring to the shattered enclave, where a hunger crisis has worsened. On Sunday, Netanyahu summoned foreign journalists to explain the blueprint, which includes what he described as a surge of humanitarian aid.
Netanyahu said that Israel will first allow civilians to leave the battle zones before forces move in on Gaza City, which he described as one of Hamas’s last two remaining strongholds, whose defeat will bring an end to the war.
But Israel’s Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, a security cabinet member who has demanded even tougher action, said the plan was designed to pressure Hamas back to the negotiating table, rather than defeat the Palestinian terrorist group, and urged Netanyahu to scrap it.
Indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas over a US proposal for a 60-day ceasefire that would have included the release of half the hostages still in Gaza ended last month in a deadlock, with major gaps still between both sides.
The mediators, Egypt and Qatar, have not given up on reviving negotiations, according to an Arab diplomat who said Israel’s decision to broadcast its new Gaza City offensive plan may not be a bluff, but it also serves to bring Hamas back to the negotiating table.
The diplomat said that there was a new willingness from Hamas to engage in constructive talks toward a ceasefire after they had seen Netanyahu’s seriousness about taking all of Gaza.
Senior Hamas official Basem Naim said the group had informed the mediators that it was still interested in reaching a ceasefire deal.
Netanyahu has not ruled out eventually opting for a deal. A source close to the prime minister said that if a relevant proposal were to emerge, it would be brought before Israel’s security cabinet.
Asked on Sunday whether he would halt the new offensive in favor of a ceasefire, Netanyahu publicly took a tougher stance.
“We are aiming for the release of all the 20 [living hostages] with the goal of defeating Hamas. We were talking about a partial deal, we went for a partial deal, but we were led astray,” he said. “We are going to destroy Hamas, we are not stopping, we are advancing,” he added.
He also said he had instructed the Israeli military to speed up its plans for the new offensive.
“I want to end the war as quickly as possible and that is why I have instructed the IDF [Israel Defense Forces] to shorten the schedule for seizing control of Gaza City,” he said. The timeline, he said, was “fairly quickly.”
But the plans laid out at the security cabinet on Thursday could take around five months to complete, according to the two officials present at the meeting.
Netanyahu’s remarks on Gaza City being the last bastion whose downfall would hasten Hamas’s defeat echoed statements ahead of another offensive, in southern Gaza, more than a year ago.
In April 2024, during a previous round of failed ceasefire negotiations, Netanyahu vowed to press on with a long promised assault in Rafah that would achieve “total victory” after tackling Hamas’s last remaining brigade there.
Israel moved on Rafah in May 2024, as hundreds of thousands of Palestinians fled the area. The group’s leader and mastermind of the 2023 attack that triggered the war, Yahya Sinwar, was killed by Israeli forces there around five months later.
But even with its top leaders dead and fighters long reduced to a guerilla force scattered among the ruins of Gaza, Netanyahu faces skepticism over the new plan – including from his military chief who called it a death trap – and of any hopes that it will end the war soon.
“This move is a danger to Israel and its security and it is pointless,” said Israel’s opposition leader Yair Lapid. “The hostages will die, soldiers will die, the economy will fall apart and Israel’s international standing will crumble.”
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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War
Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.
Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.
“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”
GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’
Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.
“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.
“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.
“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.
After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”
RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL
Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”
Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.
“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.
She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”
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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests
A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco
Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.
People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.
“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”
Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.
On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.
Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.
On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.
“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.
Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.
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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan
Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas
Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.