Key Israeli cabinet minister threatens to end the government if Rafah offensive doesn't go ahead

Agreeing to an Egyptian-mediated deal with Hamas is a 'humiliating surrender', Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said in a statement as he threatened Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to pull out of the governing coalition and cause its collapse if the latter takes the negotiated deal and halts plan to launch an offensive against Gaza's southern city of Rafah.

The deal, which would see Israeli hostages returned in exchange for no offensive in Rafah, 'constitutes a direct existential threat to the State of Israel,' he stressed. 'Talk to the people of Israel and may they ride to Rafah now and with full force'.