Netanyahu says Israel will 'allow' Gaza exodus

ISRAELI gunfire killed at least 25 people seeking aid in Gaza yesterday, local health officials and witnesses claimed, while Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel will “allow” Palestinians to leave during an upcoming military offensive in Gaza.

- ASSOCIATED PRESS REPORTERS

Mr Netanyahu wants to realise United States President Donald Trump's vision of relocating much of Gaza's population of more than two million people through what the prime minister refers to as “voluntary migration” - as critics have warned it could be ethnic cleansing.

“Give them the opportunity to leave! First, from combat zones, and also from the Strip if they want,” Mr Netanyahu said in an interview screened on Tuesday with i24, an Israeli TV station, to discuss the planned offensive in some of the territory’s most populated areas, including Gaza City. “We are not pushing them out, but allowing them to leave.”

Witnesses and staff at Nasser and Al-Awda hospitals, in Gaza, which received the bodies, said people were killed on their way to aid distribution sites and while awaiting convoys entering the Gaza Strip. Israel did not immediately respond to a request for comment.