While Israel works to defeat Hamas, a Yisrael Hayom report on Monday revealed that Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara and senior Justice Ministry officials are preventing the Defense Ministry’s Immigration Administration from advancing a voluntary emigration program for residents of the Gaza Strip.

Since negotiations for a deal collapsed, Israel has intensified operations in the Gaza Strip. However, efforts to promote the voluntary emigration of Gazans to third countries have stalled. This initiative—seen by Israel as a potentially decisive measure that could also pressure Hamas—is facing internal resistance.

Sources familiar with the details revealed that the Attorney General is preventing the Voluntary Immigration Administration from establishing a website that would provide Gazans with information on emigrating abroad. According to the report, Israeli judicial officials are also creating many obstacles to the voluntary immigration of Gazans.

The Administration, led by Maj. Gen. (Res.) Kobi Blitstein, is intended to assist Gazans who wish to leave the Strip. However, its work has been repeatedly stalled due to legal challenges by Israeli judicial authorities.

According to these sources, the Attorney General sees the possibility of emigration from the Gaza Strip as an action that is contrary to international law and has expressed this in several meetings with the political echelon. Due to her stance, Baharav-Miara is significantly curtailing the government’s actions on the issue and the activities of the Immigration Administration.

The sources noted that the right to emigrate is recognized in international law as a basic human right, and there are many judicial experts who support the policy that the Israeli government and US President Donald Trump are promoting.

Lawyers and public activists for Gazan civilians have repeatedly applied in recent months for assistance in leaving the Strip and have expressed surprise that Israel declares its desire to encourage voluntary immigration but does not allow communication with government officials for assistance and has not even established an informational website.

The report also states that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is personally engaged in the matter, holding weekly consultations to move the plan forward. Netanyahu has repeatedly asserted that immigration is a basic democratic right and not a “forced transfer.”

Meanwhile, four left-wing organizations have petitioned Baharav-Miara and Military Advocate General Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi against the program, claiming that “voluntary emigration from Gaza is effectively the deportation of a civilian population—a war crime and a crime against humanity.”

A Justice Ministry spokesperson claimed that the information in the report is “false.”

(YWN Israel Desk—Jerusalem)