ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
Israel has a new ultimatum for Hamas - release the hostages held in Gaza or else Israel will expand the war. Israel also plans a major shift in how food and supplies are handed out. The United Nations calls that proposal inhumane. NPR's Daniel Estrin is here to make sense of this. Hi, Daniel.
DANIEL ESTRIN, BYLINE: Hi, Ari.
SHAPIRO: What exactly is Israel threatening to do in Gaza?
ESTRIN: The Israeli cabinet approved new plans last night. The plans are to intensify the war in Gaza, and Israeli officials have offered some basic details. They plan to seize more land in Gaza and to have soldiers stay there indefinitely and also to push the population of Gaza into the southernmost area of Gaza, along the Egypt border, where they would get their food and basic supplies.
SHAPIRO: I called this an ultimatum. So how likely is it to actually happen?
ESTRIN: That's really unclear. I mean, reservist soldiers are already being called up to report for duty - tens of thousands of them - to help support this expanded offensive. But an Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly, has told reporters that they're actually going to give Hamas another week to agree to release Israeli hostages on Israel's favored terms. And they want to wait for President Trump to finish his tour of the Gulf, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates. He'll finish that up next week and then see whether Hamas agrees. If they don't, then they will continue with this offensive. But one major issue that's already setting up a standoff with the United Nations is Israel's plan for changing the way they deliver food in Gaza.
SHAPIRO: I want to ask you about those changes because Israel has already blocked all food and supplies into Gaza for a couple months. You've reported on widespread hunger and malnutrition there. So what is the U.N.'s objection to Israel's new plan for bringing in food?
ESTRIN: A lot of objections, and I've spoken to several officials and people briefed on Israel's plans. The plans are to shutter hundreds of soup kitchens and aid centers across Gaza and restrict food to only be delivered in an Israeli military guarded area in southern Gaza and that U.S. security contractors would be in charge of handing out food and basic household supplies and that they would use facial recognition screening to vet people coming to get the aid. Now, Israel says that this system will isolate Hamas. Israel accuses Hamas of stealing aid for its own fighters. And Israel has asked the United Nations and other aid groups to take part in this new system, but they say they won't cooperate. They're saying, in a statement, that this would be using aid as a weapon of war to try to achieve military objectives.
Now, our colleague in Gaza, NPR's Anas Baba, asked a resident of northern Gaza, Bassem Shnirwah, what he thinks. This is a man who is far away from where the food would be distributed.
BASSEM SHNIRWAH: An absolute crazy of how we would be going 30 or 40 kilometers to take food parcels. And they told us it's like dry food, I mean, not a fresh food, which made us feel like animals, actually.
ESTRIN: Feel like animals, he says. And it's not just people in Gaza worried about these new Israeli plans for the war. Many soldiers in Israel - reservists - are weary after many rounds of service in Gaza. Even the leader of Israel's opposition has questioned the wisdom of expanding the offensive there.
SHAPIRO: That is NPR's Daniel Estrin reporting from Tel Aviv. Thank you.
ESTRIN: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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