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Ben Gvir calls for nightly Gaza killings as Leo XIV urges an end to West Bank violence

Israel's national security minister called for nightly targeted killings in Gaza, while Pope Leo XIV renewed his appeal to end repeated violence against Palestinians in the West Bank and advance a two-state solution.

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At night, an amber searchlight cuts across a concrete security barrier and empty road; beyond it, softer pale light falls on olive trees before a dense low-rise city.

Ben Gvir urges nightly targeted killings in Gaza

Israel's national security minister, Itamar Ben Gvir, told an online show hosted by a former hostage that targeted killings of 30 to 40 people a night should be carried out in Gaza. The remarks aired on Saturday and spread widely through Arab media on Sunday. In the same passage he argued that Israel should not limit itself to people posing an immediate threat, saying there were people there who were not worthy of life, and he criticised Israel's recent reduction of strikes in Gaza. Ben Gvir sits in the security cabinet and controls the prison service and the national police, yet he has no authority over the military and cannot order strikes on Gaza. The call therefore lands as a public hard-line demand from a senior security politician rather than as an operational order the defence forces are bound to execute. That distinction matters for readers following who can actually set fire rules inside the territory: cabinet rank and police control do not by themselves turn a televised demand into a military campaign plan. What the broadcast still does is put an explicit nightly death tally into the open political argument over how far Israel should go as strike intensity falls.[1]

Leo XIV renews his West Bank appeal after the Angelus

After the Sunday Angelus, Pope Leo XIV renewed his call for an end to the repeated acts of violence against the Palestinian population of the West Bank. He also appealed to the international community to ensure that progress is made toward a two-state solution for a just and lasting peace. The Holy See has consistently argued that such a solution must rest on secure and internationally recognised borders and is the only viable path to a just peace between Israel and Palestine. The same address carried his hope that sporting events can be a sign of peace and fraternity, and greetings to Polish pilgrims walking to the Sanctuary of Piekary Śląskie. The diplomatic register is deliberately broad: violence against Palestinians in the West Bank is named as the immediate wrong to stop, while the two-state track is held up as the political horizon the Holy See still treats as workable. Because the appeal sits inside a regular Sunday address rather than a special crisis summit, it also signals continuity—the same frame is being repeated, not newly invented for one news cycle.[2]

References

  1. News sourceThe Times of IsraelBen Gvir argues for killing 30 to 40 people in Gaza every night↩
  2. News sourceVatican NewsLeo XIV repeats his call for the violence in the West Bank to stop↩
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