Israel vows to take control of Gaza's 'overall security' indefinitely after war

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed Monday that Israel will take control of "overall security" of besieged Gaza after the war, as the Hamas-run health ministry said the death toll has surged past 10,000.

Resisting calls for a ceasefire, Netanyahu said there would be no letup in the war to destroy Hamas, whose October 7 attack left 1,400 dead in Israel, most of them civilians.

The Palestinian militant group also took more than 240 people hostage, including children and elderly people, in an attack that prompted Israel's intensifying ground offensive.

One month since the war began, the Hamas-run health ministry said the death toll in Gaza had surpassed 10,000 people -- more than 4,000 of them children.

With international criticism of Israel's conduct of the war mounting, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Gaza was becoming a "graveyard for children".

More than 1.5 million people in densely packed Gaza have fled their homes for other parts of the territory in a desperate search for cover, with critical aid only trickling in.

But Netanyahu told ABC News the war would continue until Israel had restored "overall security" control of Gaza.

"Israel will, for an indefinite period, will have the overall security responsibility," he said.

"When we don't have that security responsibility, what we have is the eruption of Hamas terror on a scale that we couldn't imagine."

Netanyahu's comments came after the White House said the Israeli leader had discussed potential "tactical pauses" in a phone call with US President Joe Biden on Monday.

But no agreements were announced and the pair did not broach the possibility of a ceasefire.

While key Israeli ally the United States is seeking a humanitarian "pause" in the fighting, several countries and UN agencies have repeatedly called for a ceasefire.

"There will be no ceasefire -- general ceasefire -- in Gaza, without the release of our hostages," Netanyahu said.

"As far as tactical, little pauses -- an hour here, an hour there -- we've had them before. I suppose we'll check the circumstances in order to enable goods -- humanitarian goods -- to come in or our hostages, individual hostages, to leave," he added.

The Israeli army said it had pounded Gaza with "significant" strikes on 450 targets over 24 hours since Sunday morning, and that troops were targeting Hamas commanders in underground tunnels.

Israeli infantry and tanks have flooded the northern half of the Gaza Strip and tightened an encirclement of Gaza City, effectively splitting the territory in two.

Israeli troops who have taken up positions near the Gaza border told AFP they felt proud to protect their country but also nervous as the war intensifies.

Stationed near Gaza, a 20-year-old soldier said he was "a bit scared to go" into the Palestinian territory if given the order.

"You don't know if you can come back alive," said the soldier, whose name like those of other troops cannot be published because of Israeli military censorship.

Around 30 Israeli soldiers have been killed in the offensive, the latest on Monday, according to a report from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), citing Israeli sources.

Israel withdrew its troops from the Gaza Strip in 2005. A year later, Hamas won elections in Gaza, and subsequently seized control of the territory in 2007.

The Fatah party of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, which dominates the Palestinian Authority, only exercises limited autonomy in parts of the occupied West Bank.

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US Secretary of State Antony Blinken suggested last week that the Palestinian Authority should retake control of Gaza after the war, and visited the West Bank to meet Abbas on Sunday.

But Hamas said they would never accept a puppet government in Gaza and that "no force on Earth could annihilate" it, said senior Hamas official in Lebanon, Osama Hamdan.