The Israeli army continues to advance and occupy vast portions of the Gaza strip. Israel already controls 58% of the territory, but this Thursday Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu announced that he had ordered the occupation to be extended to 70 percent. This expansion is intended to corner Hamas, but also the entire Gazan population that is barely surviving the genocide. The Zionist state seeks to advance its ongoing colonization of Palestinian territory, ignoring the ceasefire signed in October and even the agreements announced by Trump months ago.
The “Yellow Line”: a Wall of Apartheid and Death
Netanyahu’s order to take control of 70% of the Gaza Strip will deepen the humanitarian catastrophe and ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people. The so-called “Yellow Line” — three-meter-high concrete barriers extending between 1.5 and 6.5 kilometers into Gaza — currently covers almost 60% of the Strip. Any Palestinian who approaches or attempts to cross the line is immediately shot. This apartheid wall entails the control and appropriation of a large part of the territory of the Strip and has led to overcrowding in refugee camps inside the remaining territory of the Strip, and the denial of food and basic rights. This policy of forced expulsion and death has been denounced as a war crime and ethnic cleansing by international organizations and critical voices such as that of Israeli historian Ilan Pappe.
Current yellow line established by Israel that covers 58% of the territory
With this new announcement, the goal is to drastically reduce the habitable territory of the Strip for the nearly two million Palestinians who have survived the genocide and condemn them to inhumane conditions. What will be the response of European or U.S. imperialism? The question might seem like a bad joke, because these core countries are the accomplices and financiers of the Israeli genocide against the Palestinian people.
Netanyahu and his far-right coalition, with the support of the Zionist opposition to his government, have been progressively advancing the occupation of Gaza since the supposed ceasefire of October 2025. In a UN briefing held last Sunday for heads of humanitarian agencies working in Gaza, it was reported that Israeli tanks had advanced east of the southern city of Khan Younis and that the anti-Hamas militia, created and funded by Israel and led by Gaza leader Ashraf al-Mansi, had advanced westward last week from the Yellow Line surrounding Jabalia. This is how Israel is occupying the Gaza Strip, after more than two years of genocide.
The Regional Front: Offensive in Lebanon
Netanyahu’s warmongering fury doesn’t stop in Gaza. In recent days, Israel has also ramped up its military offensive in southern Lebanon, with massive bombings, expanded war zones, dozens dead, and more than a million displaced. Minister of Finance, Bezalel Smotrich made Israel’s atrocities clear for everyone to see when he said bluntly that “For every drone strike, ten buildings must fall in Beirut.”
But these attacks in Lebanon and Gaza (as well as the ongoing expansion of settlements in the West Bank) are taking place within the context of a larger regional conflict with Iran in which the weakness of U.S. imperialism is on full display. Trump’s failed attempt to use the peace negotiations with Iran to force Arab countries to normalize relations with Israel through an expansion of the Abraham Accords, is just the latest example. Pakistan has already rejected this possibility, while there are reports of a possible agreement between Oman and Iran to jointly control the strategic Strait of Hormuz. As the Israeli offensive against the Palestinian people intensifies, Arab states fear an uprising among their populations if they accept the U.S. proposal.
At the same time, on Thursday, Vice President JD Vance told reporters that Washington had not yet reached an agreement with Iran, but that the parties were close to doing so. However, the Iranian news agency Tasnim, citing a member of the negotiating team, reported that the memorandum of understanding between the U.S. and Iran was by no means confirmed.
It is in this context of the crisis of U.S. Imperial hegemony, that Iran feels strengthened to not give in to Trump’s whims and extortions.
Originally Published in Spanish on May 29 in La Izquierda Diaro.
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