Gaza: Israeli PM Netanyahu says Rafah attack will happen regardless of deal

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel would continue to occupy the southern Gaza city of Rafah regardless of peace talks with Hamas. This comes amid efforts to reach an agreement on a ceasefire and the release of hostages. But at a meeting of relatives of the hostages, Netanyahu said he would attack with or without a deal.

His comments followed renewed US warnings against an invasion of Rafah unless civilians were properly protected. In a phone call with Netanyahu on Sunday, US President Joe Biden reiterated his clear position on Rafa , the White House said in a statement. Biden previously called Rafa's invasion a "red line."

More than half of Gaza's 2.5 million people live in Rafah, fleeing the fighting in other parts of the territory. Conditions in the overcrowded city are dire, with displaced people speaking of lack of food, water and medicine. "We will enter Rafah and we will eliminate the Hamas battalions there, with or without a deal, to achieve total victory," Netanyahu's office said in a statement.

About 130 hostages from among 253 kidnapped by Hamas during its unprecedented attack on Israel on October 7 remain unaccounted for. At least 34 of them are presumed dead. The rest have been released or rescued. Meanwhile, the head of the UN's refugee agency warned that the attack was leaving people in Rafah with "persistent traumatic stress disorder".

"I want to make one thing clear: no decision at The Hague or anywhere else will harm our determination to achieve all the war aims," the prime minister said. Israel has never ratified the ICC's founding treaty, the Rome Statute, and Netanyahu has insisted that the ICC has "no authority" over the country. However, the ICC ruled in 2015 that the Palestinians had jurisdiction because they had ratified the treaty.