The United States wants the war in Gaza to "end as soon as possible," the White House said Thursday, after the Israeli Occupation's defense minister told a top US official the war would last several months more.

US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan had also discussed the Israeli Occupation moving to "low-intensity operations" against Gaza "in the near future" during his visit to Tel Aviv, White House spokesman John Kirby said.

Kirby said: "We all want it to end as soon as possible. And as I said in my opening statement yesterday and today, it could end today if (Hamas leader Yahya, ed) Sinwar, did the right thing and just laid down his arms and surrendered and just gave the hostages back. That doesn't look likely right now in this war that Hamas started. And Israel has a right and responsibility to continue to conduct this war to protect their people and to protect their nation. How long that's going to take? I can't predict. We're not, you know, we're not dictating terms to the Israelis about how long it has to take. It has to take as long as they feel they need to take to be able to eliminate this threat, but obviously we all want it to be over as soon as possible."

This came on day 69 of the continued Israeli Occupation's aggression on the Gaza Strip, which has resulted in more than 18,000 martyrs and over 50,000 injuries.