Top Biden adviser meets Israeli leaders amid disagreements over war.

Israel’s defense minister said Thursday that the war against Hamas “will last more than several months,” signaling the determination to continue bombing Gaza even as the White House national security adviser in Tel Aviv arrived to discuss a timetable for ending the fighting. .

Before meeting US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, Defense Secretary Yoav Gallant reiterated Israel’s arguments that destroying Hamas, the armed group that carried out the devastating October 7 attacks in Israel, was essential to Israel’s security and was difficult because Hamas has an extensive underground infrastructure in Gaza.

“It will take a long period of time — it will take more than a few months, but we will win and we will destroy them,” Mr. Gallant said in brief remarks before meeting Mr. Sullivan.

The comments showed that the Israeli government was unlikely to be swayed by international condemnation of the enormous civilian toll of the war in Gaza. Mr. Sullivan had said before his visit — which will include a meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — that one of the topics for discussion with Israeli officials would be “how they see the timetable of this war.”

The rift between the United States and Israel has widened over Israel’s warfare against Hamas and a post-war settlement for the Gaza Strip.

On Tuesday, President Biden leveled some of his harshest criticism yet at Netanyahu’s government, which he said had no interest in allowing the creation of an independent Palestinian state. Israel began to lose international support, he added, because of the “indiscriminate bombing” of Gaza.

But the White House appeared to downplay Biden’s comments on Wednesday, with a spokesman, John F. Kirby, saying the president was merely expressing concern about the rising number of civilian casualties in the war.

Top Israeli officials were publicly unperturbed by Mr. Biden’s comments, stressing that they would not be deterred from continuing the military assault in Gaza until Hamas’s armed wing is destroyed and its leaders killed. “We will continue until the end,” Netanyahu wrote on social media. “It’s not even a question.”

Netanyahu’s government and the Biden administration have mainly tried to cover up their divisions since Hamas killed at least 1,200 people in southern Israel on October 7. Israel has responded with more than two months of bombing and a ground invasion of Gaza, causing deaths. at least 15,000 people, and likely thousands more, according to Gaza health officials, and forced most of the territory’s 2.2 million people to flee their homes.

Amid an international outcry over the toll on Gaza residents, Mr Biden has said Israel must do more to protect civilians, but has remained steadfast in supporting his right to respond to the attack October 7.

The United States and Israel also have differences over who should control Gaza after the war. US officials have said the Palestinian Authority, which has international support, should control the enclave, while Mr Netanyahu appears to have ruled that out for now.