killed 9,770<\/a> people, most of them women and children, the Gaza health ministry says.<\/p>\nWhen the interviewer asked whether the Israeli minister advocated dropping \u201csome kind of atomic bomb\u201d on the Gaza Strip \u201cto kill everyone\u201d, Eliyahu replied: \u201cThat\u2019s one option\u201d.<\/p>\n
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu\u2019s office quickly responded in a statement, describing Eliyahu\u2019s remarks as \u201cdisconnected from reality\u201d and adding that Israel was trying to spare \u201cnon-combatants\u201d in Gaza.<\/p>\n
Netanyahu\u2019s office issued a statement saying that the heritage minister, from a far-right party in the coalition government, was suspended from cabinet meetings \u201cuntil further notice\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cEliyahu\u2019s statements are not based in reality. Israel and the IDF (military) are operating in accordance with the highest standards of international law to avoid harming innocents. We will continue to do so until our victory,\u201d Netanyahu\u2019s office said.<\/p>\n
A spokesperson for Hamas said Eliyahu represented \u201cunprecedented criminal Israeli terrorism [that] constitutes a danger to the entire region and the world\u201d.<\/p>\n
In a follow-up question about the estimated 240 hostages held in Gaza, Eliyahu said that \u201cin war, we pay a price.\u201d \u201cWhy are the lives of the hostages \u2026 more important than the lives of the soldiers?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The Hostages and Missing Persons Families Forum, representing relatives of people taken hostage by Hamas, slammed Eliyahu\u2019s \u201creckless and cruel\u201d statement.<\/p>\n
\u201cInternational law, along with fundamental principles of human morality and common sense, strictly prohibits the use of mass destruction weapons,\u201d it said in a statement, calling for the release of all the hostages.<\/p>\n
Following the outcry over his remarks, Eliyahu said in a post on X, formerly Twitter, that his statement about the atomic bomb was \u201cmetaphorical\u201d.<\/p>\n
He also said that Israel was \u201ccommitted to doing everything possible to return the hostages safe and sound\u201d.<\/p>\n
Israel has never admitted to having a nuclear bomb.<\/p>\n
Outrage over minister\u2019s remarks<\/h2>\n
Arab League chief Ahmed Aboul Gheit said Eliyahu\u2019s remarks reveal that \u201cIsrael possesses nuclear weapons, which is an open secret\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut it confirms the truth of the racist view Israelis hold against Palestinians. This is the true face of the occupation government,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Saudi Arabia criticised the Netanyahu government for not dismissing him.<\/p>\n
\u201cFailing to immediately dismiss the minister from the government and simply freezing his membership reflects the height of disdain for all human, moral, religious and legal standards and values of the Israeli government,\u201d the Saudi foreign ministry said in a statement.<\/p>\n
Jordan said the minister\u2019s remarks were a \u201ccall for genocide and a hate crime\u201d against the Palestinians.<\/p>\n
Former prime minister Shehbaz Sharif condemned the Israeli minister\u2019s remarks, saying that this \u201cextremist mindset with access to nuclear power poses a grave danger to global peace\u201d.<\/p>\n
The PML-N leader called on the International Atomic Energy Agency to \u201cmonitor the Zionist state\u2019s nuclear sites\u201d and called on the world to \u201crespond decisively to this extremism and nuclear madness\u201d.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
An Israeli minister was suspended from government meetings \u201cuntil further notice\u201d on Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu\u2019s office said, after suggesting dropping a nuclear bomb on Gaza during an interview. The comments by Heritage Minister Amichay Eliyahu advocating a fierce military response to Hamas\u2019 October 7 surprise attacks even at the cost of the lives […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21584,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/i.dawn.com\/large\/2023\/11\/05190942df543ac.jpg?r=200402","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[192],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21583","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-islamabad-news"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21583","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21583"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21583\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21584"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21583"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21583"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21583"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}