do want to take you to the Israeli government briefing that is now officially underway. Good afternoon, uh, ladies and gentlemen. Shalom. I'm David Mensa Israeli government. spokesman today. is Thursday the 30th of May Day? 237 of the October 7th War? and our war aims haven't changed. since Hamas Army of Terror invaded. our border to destroy. Hamas military and governing capabilities to free. all 125 hostages and Ensure. that Gaza will never pose a threat to Israel again all of our objectives are within reach Israel. will not compromise. on any of them. We start today with the desperately sad news of IDF casualties since the outset of the war IDF fatalities. Have unfortunately risen. to 642. staff sergeant, yidda. Augi was aged just 21 from Reva. He was killed in battle in Northern Gaza. He leaves behind his parents. and 5 Brothers and sisters staff sergeant eliyah was 20 and from telion he leaves behind his parents. his sister's and his brother. Brothers staff sergeant Diego shisha haraj was 20 and from Tel Aviv. He leaves behind. his parents. both of them Aaliyah and Diego were killed in a car ramming. terror attack in Samaria yesterday. in the West Bank near Nablus. There are no words of mine that can assuage the pain of their parents and families. We embrace them. and those dear families who have lost their precious Heroes. sons and daughters. in this war for our very existence. the price of war is heavy. and painful each casualty is a world. unto itself. May their memories be a blessing. forever. So this was why Israel targeted? and eliminated the 2? ham henchmen on Sunday night. responsible for these attacks in Judea and Samaria West Bank and the shooting attack uh, just yesterday. into the Israeli Village of Badr from Palestinian. by Palestinian terrorists. shooting from telcar which is under the control of the Palestinian Authority. every day we thwart Terror attacks in Judea and Samaria. on the roads and in the communities Israel will continue. with a very strong deployment. in both defense. and defense. to thought terrorism and ensure the security of our residents. next an operational update regarding our precise. and targeted operation in rougher. We are using a limited number of troops in this intelligence-led. operation to destroy Hamas and bring home our hostages. in rougher. I can confirm. reports that. significantly. IDF troops. have operational control of the Philadelphia corridor. the narrow Corridor the na the narrow border Corridor between Egypt and rougher the corridor. has been the Hamas lifeline. It has kept. Hamas alive with their smuggled deadly weapons we have already. eliminated around 3. terrorists in rougher. in this operation. so far. Some of them were high. fought them bravely. in quote Close Quarters combat. very very difficult conditions. We have lost our own troops we mentioned just yesterday. 3 of our boys. soldiers have been seriously injured but IDF have found. dozens of launches. along the corridor. launchers loaded. and ready to and rockets launched pits with rockets and mortars again. loaded and ready to fire. into Israel right up against the border with Egypt Why did Hamas place these weapons there? You see how much hoped that Israel would be. wary of returning fire. for risk of hitting Egypt. in the last few weeks alone. Hamas has fired. 700 rockets and mortars. from the rougher area. in eastern rougher we've uncovered extensive. underground terrorist complexes. We've located around. 20 tunnels in the Philadelphia. corridor. area. We are neutralizing them. We are neutralizing them tunnels. that were used to transfer weapons and initiate Terror attacks. We found. large quantities of weapons. For example. anti-tank missiles. AK-47s explosives grenades. It's an extremely complex environment with many. terrorists. But we make this very clear. No force in the world will stop Israel. from bringing all 125 hostages home. and defeating Hamas. We will not forget our hostages not even. for a moment now the Hamas fake news propaganda War has certainly stepped up a gear false reports. claimed that we struck the alma wasi area. I myself. have received. uh requests. from journalists. about this issue. our troops did not operate. in the area. I say that again, our troops did not operate. in the almai area. in addition, I want to share with you that we have revealed. documents that are available on the IDF website. that during this war. Hamas. stole. 400 million shekels from the bank of Palestine that's 110 million or 85 million pounds Funds that belong to ordinary. Gardens. look Hamas has no boundaries. It exploits its own people it hides. beneath them. amongst them. It steals their money from Bank vaults. Without Limits Hamas will do. anything to ensure. its survival. All eyes on rougher says the campaign on social media well our eyes are on rougher. But we are tightening the Noose. lastly an update from our efforts to flood Gaza with Aid and counter hamasa efforts to increase the civilian. suffering there. 335 humanitarian a trucks went into Gaza just yesterday. 5 tankers. That's 267. L of fuel for essential. Gaza infrastructure went in Israel has ensured continuity of fuel supply. all that is needed our requests. through the relevant channels and we always facilitate them always. 41 trucks were transferred to Northern Gaza. 2 unfpa. That's the UN. population fund. mobile. maternity rooms. were transferred to Gaza yesterday. We continue to expand our effort to facilitate Aid Medical Aid into and across Gaza. you know since the beginning of this war. 31 trucks. delivering. 600,000 tons of humanitarian Aid. have entered Gaza more food and Aid enters the Gaza Strip every single. day 80% more food. compared to what was imported to Gaza. Before October 7th. so that's the end of our briefing today. I will now take your questions which you should put uh in the chat. uh with your news Outlet. I'll be reading the questions today first question from Dan Williams at Reuters, uh, Israeli media are reporting that mad. has uncovered in Iranian backed cell. which has carried out? attacks in Europe and is planning more ahead of the Paris Olympics. Can you confirm and provide details? so, thank you very much. uh for that question. uh, Dan I haven't got anything more to add to those. Uh media reports what I can tell you is that Israeli Security Services have worked. with European. Um security Services to prevent. attacks on European. soil. I know this, uh, for a fact this is already public knowledge that in the UK. uh, for instance. uh, Israel has prevented Israeli Security Forces has prevented the deaths of say the lives of many. Brits. uh across the UK from these same, uh, Iranian, Um, uh, terrorist activity So I can't add any more on that specific case about the Paris Olympics, but I certainly can confirm. that Israeli Security Services have in the past. uh supported uh, European supported. uh, uh Security Services to save. lives particularly. against uh, Iranian terrorists. uh the next question from Dan Williams is Israel's expected to restart. Uh, mediated hostage release talks this week. when and where will that happen? So again, thank you for that question. Uh, Dan, Um, I can confirm that. uh, the Prime Minister and the uh War cabinet has agreed. for negotiations to continue. uh when it comes to releasing our hostages, we know what's been effective in the past. in November for instance. It's a combination of sustained. military pressure. uh on Hamas, which we are currently doing. uh in rafah and across uh Gaza together with negotiations. the negotiation the negotiators have been given instructions. instructions, uh by the P prime minister and the security cabinet to do everything. they possibly can. to get our people home. Uh, it's a shocking human, right? Uh human rights abuse every single moment of the day. that our stolen people remain. its 1 of our war aims and we will bring these people home. question here from uh, Joel Pollock at Breitbart News so South Africa's ruling party the uh, Africa African National Congress or ANC is projected to lose its majority. for the excuse me. for the first time since yesterday's election. and after running a campaign that emphasized its opposition to Israel on the world stage. campaign posters even featured the slogan free Palestine yet. the ANC suffered historic losses. this Israel believed there is a connection between the anc's opposition to Israel and the poor vote result uh, so Joel. Thank you very much. uh for that question. Uh, I will resist the uh opportunity. to interfere in South African internal politics. and their elections. That's obviously up to uh, South Africa's people to choose. Uh, who wishes to uh rule over them. what I can say is that the South South African government in supporting in initializing and um championing the effort to prosecute Israel at the uh, icj. um was simply an effect to act as a pro bono lawyer. for the terrorists organization of Hamas. It was an outrageous. uh quite frankly. shocking. attempt. by uh, ah, ah, ah, ah state which uh, did unfortunately was unfortunately held in very high regard. in this country. I I need I remind you that so many Jews. uh accompanied um Nelson Mandela on his long walk. uh to Freedom. and to have uh that State, uh, South Africa Um, acting in partnership with Iran. and other negative. Um, uh forces around the world, detrimental forces around the world. uh was a shocking development. so I won't get involved in internal politics of South Africa, but none of us here in Israel will forget that. uh, South Africa. were the pro bono lawyers. for Hamas case against us. next question from Leo Soroka at the Washington Post Excuse me. uh according to OSHA the flow of humanitarian aid supplies. into Gaza has dropped. by 67, uh 67% since 7th of May. Since the operation in rougher any comment coat is not uh answering Thank you very much. uh for that question. Leo, so every single day. of these briefings we've been giving you uh, the the figures of the aid trucks, uh going in every single day. uh, going they are going up and up and up. uh an average of around. 300 yesterday with 400. Sometimes it's down to 250 but every single day those a trucks have go in and have gone in and they've gone in for the simple reason that we know that Hamas steals the aid and we know that they keep them for themselves. There's No 1 hungry. in a mass. It's very important to remember that when we've arrested them. They've certainly had no problems with their waistline whatsoever. Hamas steal the age and they uh, sometimes they sell it back onto the black market for a vastly inflated prices. but we've managed to lower. uh, the prices on uh the markets, uh inside. uh Gaza, which pictures can show you they're on um, the uh Cote Twitter feed every single day of bustling markets. Uh, prices have gone down precisely because we have uh flooded the area uh with food we've pushed its much food as we possibly can. uh get in whoever's donated a to to Garns we have tried our hardest to facilitate it getting in. the only change. that there has been is when Hamas itself have bombed the Kam Shalom Crossing where so much of the aid has gone in and even then we have reopened the Kam Shalom Crossing. as soon as we possibly have been able to and we've also pushed Aid in through the uh Crossings, uh at errors and in every other way. through land sea and air so Aid is going in all the time. Uh, I simply don't recognize that as being uh, correct. Um, and I'm sure coat will get back to you. um next question from Hannah Julian, uh of the Jewish press Uh, there's 2 questions here The first 1 is excuse me. How is the Honorable that passed its first reading this week? different? from the bad that was passed. uh in febuary. Can you comment on the proposed? Uh legislation? Uh, thank you. Hannah. I have seen those reports about the uh knesset bill. uh here in Israel. Um, uh to ban. uh unra, um, I can't comment specifically on the particulars of that particular bill. what I can share with you is what we have shared with the United Nations actually. that anra has operated hand in hand. hand in hand. uh with uh Hamas, uh through so many ways. firstly uh through um, anra employees actively participating in the October 7th Massacre. through an employees actually holding on. to our hostages. sometimes live and even dead. uh hostages. through the uh, cooperation of Hamas putting their server Farm underneath unresponsive through the fact that uh sinwa himself Yakiya sinwa himself. was a senior. Um, uh unra, uh Trade union uh official uh for a long time. uh, not so long ago, we and the fact that so many members of anra are also. employees of anra are also uh members of Hamas look the the we've we've laid the evidence out so clearly about the relationship with anra and I tell you what gets me personally. is that International media? continue to use? spokespeople from anra? to give them an idea of what's Happening? uh in rougher for instance? Unra is a tainted operation. They are. very inefficient. They bring the reputation. of the United Nations. down because of their inefficiency and their ineptitude. and of course. they continue uh to run schools. and they have run schools for many years. that promote anti-Semitism. They promote you hatred and also the lie that of course, uh that uh, uh Palestinians will 1 day be able to uh, erase Israel of the face of the map that uh, Palestinian children will be able to go back to and live and usurp. Uh, uh, the the state of Israel. uh in Jaffa and Rafa. Um, uh in in in Hefe and in Jaffa, uh ridiculous. ideas instead of educating for coexistence. and peace. They perpetuate this conflict. So the sins of anra are clear for everyone to see yes, of course. It's headed notionally. by Philip lazzarini, uh in Geneva, but it's the unra um, Hamas henchman on the ground which the ground, the shots. and really it's about time that this Dreadful organization that perpetuates this conflict that keeps that has kept gazans in misery. for all these years. is disbanded. and genuine Aid agencies are able to use the generous funds which uh, uh, guards and get from the International Community and not sink it into the ground. this terrible terror tunnel Network. twice the size of the London Underground and instead. build up institutions hospitals schools uh better roads uh Better Health Care facilities for ordinary Gardens to give themselves, uh to give guards and to better future. second question from Hannah Julian of the Jewish press what was the Target that was attacked yesterday in? banyas. Where? Syria says 1 child. and 10 civilians. uh were wounded. Uh, thank you for Hannah. Um, I haven't seen that report and I don't know the answer to that question. Um, I suggest you would ask the IDF. uh who may may have some more information on that. um next question from uh, Jim Williams of Zeno international news. uh does the prime minister? agree with the national? Security adviser? at sake that the war with Hamas? could last? into 2025? So thank you very much. uh for that question. Look Jim, uh, our war aims remain the same they are. to remove Hamas from power to strip away any of its governing. uh, or military capabilities to bring home our hostages. and to of course to make sure that Gaza never again poses a threat. uh to this country. or to anyone in the Civilized world. ever again. we will keep going until the job is done. and I tell you the reason for that. is that we simply refuse to live next to this genocidal organization. Israelis when they go to bed at night. need to be sure that they will not be murdered. at 6:30 a.m. at the following morning as they were. on October the 7th. we need to be sure that this genocidal murderous organization. uh, wherever it is. in Gaza or in the West Bank is obliterated. and defeated. So that brings us to the end of this, uh of today's briefing. Uh, we'll have another briefing for you. uh on Monday. uh in the meantime, please do stay safe and thank you very much.
