Thousands of Israeli reservists report for duty as military chief clashes with ministers

JERUSALEM/CAIRO/GAZA: Tens of thousands of reservists began to report for duty on Tuesday for a new Israeli offensive to seize Gaza City, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants to accelerate despite warnings from senior ranks.

Palestinian health authorities said further Israeli airstrikes and shelling across the Gaza Strip had killed at least 100 people on Tuesday, 35 of them in Gaza City in the enclave’s north as Israeli forces girded for the offensive.

Israeli Army Radio said 40,000 reservists would report for duty on Tuesday.

Israel’s security cabinet, chaired by Netanyahu, approved a plan last month to expand the nearly two-year-old military campaign in Gaza to take control of Gaza City, which Israeli forces stormed early in the war and waged fierce urban warfare with Hamas. Israel currently holds about 75% of the Gaza Strip.

A security cabinet meeting late on Sunday included angry exchanges between Netanyahu and his ministers, who want to expedite the offensive, and armed forces chief Eyal Zamir, who has urged the politicians to reach a ceasefire deal with Hamas.

Zamir said a military thrust into Gaza City would endanger hostages and further strain the already overstretched army, according to four ministers and two military officials present at the meeting.

Zamir has clashed with the cabinet before. Netanyahu said on August 20 that he had ordered a faster push to take Gaza City, but the next day the military said hostages could be endangered, and that any offensive could not begin for two months, according to a source in Netanyahu’s circle and a defence official.

The military said more time was needed for aid to civilians in Gaza, where starvation has spread. But surveys have also shown many reservists are unhappy with the cabinet’s plans, some openly accusing the government of lacking a cohesive strategy, a post-war plan for Gaza or a clear benchmark for victory.

“I don’t feel like I’m doing anything that really applies significant pressure to have Hamas release the hostages,” one combat reservist who has been serving in Gaza since October 7, 2023, when the war began, told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity as he was not authorised to speak publicly.