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15-09-2025
JERUSALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has not ruled out further strikes on Hamas leaders following last week’s attack in Qatar, saying they would not have immunity “wherever they are”.
Speaking at a joint press conference with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Jerusalem, Netanyahu said every country had the right “to defend itself beyond its borders”.
Israel’s decision to target senior Hamas leaders in Qatar, a close US ally, drew international outrage and criticism from US President Donald Trump. Hamas said six people were killed but that its leaders survived.
When pressed on whether the US had any involvement in the strike, Netanyahu told journalists; “we did it on our own. Period.”
In response to a question of media about whether Israel’s strike had damaged US relations in the region, Rubio said Washington maintained “strong relationships with our Gulf allies”.
The meeting between Rubio and Netanyahu comes as Arab leaders hold a summit in a show of support for Qatar. Its prime minister urged the international community to stop applying “double standards” and to punish Israel.
Qatar hosts a major US airbase and has played a key role in brokering diplomatic efforts to end the war in Gaza, serving as a mediator of indirect negotiations between Hamas and Israel. It has hosted the Hamas political bureau since 2012.
On Sunday, Netanyahu told reporters that the US-Israel relationship was as “durable as the stones in the Western Wall” while he and Rubio made a short visit to the holy site in Jerusalem’s Old City.
During the trip on which they were accompanied by US ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, Rubio wrote a note and placed it into the wall, a traditional ritual performed by visitors. The men ignored reporters’ questions focusing on Israel’s strikes in Qatar.
Also thought to have been discussed by Netanyahu and Rubio are Israeli military plans to seize Gaza City and Israel’s continued expansion of settlements in the occupied West Bank.
Over the weekend, the Israeli military pressed ahead with the demolition of residential buildings in Gaza City, and according to local media, is now poised to begin ground operations in the Western neighborhoods of the city.
It has demanded that Gaza City’s residents leave and head south to a central area of the strip. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) estimate about 250,000 Palestinians have fled, though hundreds of thousands are believed to remain in the area.
Some say they cannot afford to go south, while others say southern Gaza is not safe as Israel has carried out air strikes there too. Some have said they attempted to go south but were unable to pitch their tents, so returned to Gaza City.
The UN has warned an intensification of the offensive on an area where a famine has already been declared will push civilians into an “even deeper catastrophe”.
Netanyahu and Rubio’s meeting comes ahead of a UN General Assembly session next week, at which some leading US allies including the UK, France, Canada, Australia and Belgium are expected to recognize the State of Palestine.
This expected recognition has intensified debate within Israel around the future of the West Bank, with more hardline elements of the government insisting annexation is the only way to prevent a Palestinian state.
In late August, the Israeli government gave final approval for the E1 settlement project east of Jerusalem, which would, in effect, split the West Bank in two, dividing the Palestinian populations in the north and south. (Int’l News Desk)
