Liberman: Hamas should have spent tunnel money on water, health

Liberman believes Hamas should stop spending its money on war and killing people and instead invest in the development of Gaza

By GIL HOFFMAN
Avigdor Liberman (photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
Avigdor Liberman
(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
If Hamas would have invested the $260 million it spent on terror tunnels and rockets on its water and health systems, the Gaza Strip would be in a much better situation, Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman told the Yisrael Beytenu faction on Monday.
Liberman said Hamas continued to attempt to build tunnels and to test and fire rockets, including three rockets fired overnight into the Mediterranean Sea.
“I hear a lot about a difficult humanitarian situation in Gaza – but that the way to solve it is for Hamas to stop spending its money on war and killing people and instead invest in the development of Gaza.”
Liberman said Iran provided Hamas and Islamic Jihad $100 million annually for terror. He said that to counter that terror, Israel has a six-point strategic plan.
The plan includes returning missing and captive soldiers, destroying all terror tunnels by the end of the year, completing an underground barrier between Israel and Gaza, responding to all rocket and mortar fire, strengthening communities in the Gaza periphery, and demilitarizing and rehabilitating Gaza.
Liberman condemned Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas’s speech in which he denied the Jewish connection to Israel, rejected any negotiations as long as Donald Trump is US president and called for destroying Trump’s house.