India, Sept. 27 -- Israel's finance minister Bezalel Smotrich on Sunday called for a war against Palestinians in the West Bank, which it has occupied since 1967. The far-right leader also pushed for annexation of areas of south Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, which are also under the control of the Israeli military.

"I think we need to go to war in Judea and Samaria (biblical names for the West Bank), to dismantle the Palestinian Authority that supports terror," news agency AFP quoted Smotrich as saying. He was speaking on a podcast for Israeli news site Ynet.

The Israeli minister said he wanted Israel to annex "as far as the Yellow Line in Gaza and as far as the Litani River in Lebanon". The line demarcates the areas under the control of H...