The Israeli Minister of Security, Yoav Galant, said that the Israeli ground incursion into the besieged Gaza Strip will continue for “long months,” indicating that it will include the north and south of the Strip, in the first public statement by an Israeli official that the ground invasion of the Gaza Strip will include the southern regions, which are now teeming with hundreds of thousands of displaced people from the northern Gaza Strip.

This came in a press conference held by the Israeli Minister of Security this evening, Tuesday, to review the developments in Israeli military operations in the Gaza Strip. He said that “no place will be immune in the Gaza Strip until Israel achieves its declared war goals, which are eliminating the Hamas movement and releasing the prisoners.” And hostages held by the resistance in Gaza.

Gallant was also asked during the press conference “whether the release of Palestinian prisoners in occupation prisons, under a prisoner exchange deal with the Hamas movement, “does not constitute a security threat to the citizens of Israel,” and Gallant refused to answer, and said: “It is good that there is more hidden in this matter than what is declared".

The Israeli "war cabinet" will be held this evening to discuss a prisoner exchange deal with Hamas, according to Israeli reports, in reference to a deal that may include the release of civilian hostages in the Gaza Strip, with a focus on women, children and dual nationals, in exchange for the release of prisoners. Women and children in occupation prisons and a humanitarian truce in Gaza for a period ranging between 3 and 5 days.

Gallant claimed that the Israeli army now controls the northern and central sectors of the Gaza Strip, including Gaza City, and added that he "approved plans to continue progress today and in the coming days. There will be no safe place in Gaza until we complete our mission and return the hostages."

At the conclusion of a visit to Israeli towns and military sites near the border areas with Lebanon, the minister in the Israeli “war cabinet,” Betty Gantz, said on Tuesday evening that “even if it required a ceasefire in order to return the hostages (held by the resistance factions in Gaza) "There will be no stopping to the war. We will continue until the goals are achieved."

Gantz added, "Even in these days and in these moments, we are making every political and military effort to return the hostages to their homes safely. Every effort is being made to return them all by any means. We will not return (from the war) until all tasks are completed, and we will continue fighting until the reality inside "Our borders"  changes.

Earlier today, the Israeli army announced its control of several government buildings in the Gaza Strip at a time when the ongoing fighting has intensified since the seventh of last October. The occupation army claimed that its forces "captured the Hamas parliament (legislative council), the government building, the Hamas police headquarters, and an engineering college that served as an institute for weapons production and development."