Israel’s Minister Says Israelis’ ‘Right To Life’ More Important Than Palestinian Freedoms

Israel's National Security Minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, has once again sparked outrage by stating that Israelis' "right to life" supersedes Palestinians’ freedom of movement. The far right minister made the remarks near the scene of a shooting attack that killed three Israeli police officers in Tarqumiyah on Sunday.

The shooting attack follows a series of Israeli raids in the occupied West Bank, including in Jenin. As Israel continues its raids, the electricity and power supply in Jenin has been cut off.

"The water is cut off. The electricity is cut off, the sewage system is no longer working. All the infrastructure is destroyed, we no longer have any services that work,” resident Faiza Abu Jaafar told news agency AFP.

Ben-Gvir, who encourages illegal settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank, last month caused a stir in a television interview when he told the interviewer that “My right and that of my wife and my children, to travel on the roads in Judea and Samaria, is more important than the freedom of movement for Arabs.”

“That is the reality, that is the truth. My right to life precedes your freedom of movement,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Israeli military has recovered the bodies of six hostages from a Hamas tunnel in Gaza city of Rafah. As per the IDF, the hostages were murdered by Hamas militants one or two days before troops reached the site. Hamas has blamed Israel for the death of those captives.

The hostages have been identified as Hersh Goldberg-Polin, 23, Eden Yerushalmi, 24, Ori Danino, 25, Alex Lubnov, 32, Carmel Gat, 40, and Almog Sarusi, 25.

So far, at least 40,691 people have been killed and 94,060 wounded in Israel’s war on Gaza. An estimated 1,139 people were killed in Israel during the Hamas-led attacks on October 7.