Israel and the United States are both determined to thwart Iran’s nuclear ambitions and its “aggression” in the Middle East, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday following a meeting with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
Speaking after a meeting with Rubio in Jerusalem, Netanyahu said they had held a “very productive discussion” on a number of issues, “none more important than Iran”.
“Israel and America stand shoulder to shoulder in countering the threat of Iran,” he said. “We agreed that the ayatollahs must not have nuclear weapons and also agreed that Iran’s aggression in the region must be rolled back.”
Rubio claimed: “Behind every terrorist group, behind every act of violence, behind every destabilising activity, behind everything that threatens peace and stability for the millions of people that call this region home is Iran.”
Netanyahu said Israel had dealt a “mighty blow” to Iran over the past 16 months since the start of the aggression in Gaza and said that with the support of Trump he has no doubt Israel can and “will finish the job”.
He claimed Israel had weakened Hezbollah movement in southern Lebanon and had hit hundreds of targets in Syria to prevent a new Iranian-backed front opening up against Israel.
“Now, if any other force believes that Israel will permit other hostile forces to use Syria as a base of operations against us, they are gravely mistaken,” Netanyahu said.
Thanking Rubio for “unequivocal backing” for Israel’s policy in Gaza, Netanyahu said Israel and the United States under President Donald Trump shared a common strategy in the Palestinian enclave, where a fragile ceasefire is in effect between Israel and Hamas.
“I want to assure everyone who’s now listening to us, President Trump and I are working in full cooperation and coordination between us,” he said.
Rubio added: “Hamas can not continue as a military or government force and as long as it stands as a force that can govern or administer or a force that can threaten by use of violence, peace becomes impossible.”
Netanyahu vowed on Sunday to “open the gates of hell” in Gaza if Hamas does not return all hostages, pointing to a joint US-Israeli strategy to take on the Palestinian fighters.
“We have a common strategy, and we can’t always share the details of this strategy with the public, including when the gates of hell will be opened, as they surely will if all our hostages are not released until the last one,” Netanyahu said in a joint statement with visiting US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
“We will eliminate Hamas’s military capability and its political rule in Gaza,” the statement added. “We will bring all our hostages home, and we will ensure that Gaza never again poses a threat to Israel.
“The unequivocal support of the United States on Gaza will help us achieve these objectives faster and set us on a path for a different future,” Netanyahu said.
He added that he discussed with Rubio US President Donald Trump’s “bold vision for Gaza’s future and will work to ensure that vision becomes a reality”.
Trump recently suggested that the US take over the Gaza Strip and turn it into a “Riviera of the Middle East”, while resettling the territory’s two million Palestinian residents in other countries, namely Egypt and Jordan.
The proposal has triggered global outrage.
Rubio on Sunday acknowledged that Trump’s proposal for Gaza “may have shocked and surprised” many.
But he said “the president’s also been very bold about his view of what the future for Gaza should be, not the same tired ideas of the past, but something that’s bold and something that, frankly, took courage and vision.
“What cannot continue is the same cycle where we repeat over and over again and wind up in the exact same place,” Rubio said. “Hamas cannot continue as a military or a government force… they must be eliminated… it must be eradicated.”
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