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Netanyahu returns to war amid mounting political pressure at home | Avi Melamed’s insights quoted in this article by Gerry Shih and Shira Rubin for The Washington Post.
Avi Melamed, a former Israeli military intelligence official, said the high-level infighting and mass protests have been ramping up the pressures on Netanyahu but would not deter him. If anything, they motivated him to keep fighting.
“At the end of the day, Netanyahu’s government is hanging by a thread, and it depends on the far right,” he said. “And they have been very clearly pressuring him not to stop the war, but to resume the war.”
After Israel launched airstrikes against Hamas on Tuesday, killing hundreds of people in one of the deadliest days of the war, some Israeli and U.S. officials said the surprise operation came in response to the militant group’s recalcitrance during recent negotiations. Others said it was to preempt an imminent attack that Hamas was plotting against Israel.
But leaders from across Israel’s political spectrum and analysts say the decision to resume fighting was also influenced by the mounting domestic pressures on Benjamin Netanyahu.
In recent days, the Israeli prime minister has publicly feuded with officials from the country’s security establishment, including many who favor reaching a deal with Hamas to recover all the hostages left in Gaza. He has announced his intent to fire his internal intelligence chief, prompting calls for mass street protests. And most pressing, Netanyahu is facing a March 31 deadline to corral enough votes in the Knesset to pass a national budget — or otherwise see his government forced to dissolve under Israeli law.
In resuming war, the Israeli leader not only sought to redirect the country’s attention, political observers say, but also cemented a governing coalition that can help him get past his most immediate political hurdles. As Netanyahu prepared to enter delicate discussions with his coalition partners over the budget this week, some members of allied ultra-Orthodox Jewish parties threatened to withhold their votes and derail its passage. Instead, Netanyahu shored up support from far-right political parties that have insisted that he resume the war, said Chuck Freilich, a former Israeli deputy national security adviser.
“There is a military case to be made that Hamas wasn’t destroyed and is in the process of reconstituting, but there is no way to divorce this from the political events,” Freilich said. “I don’t think anyone can ignore the timing.”
Hours after the start of the Israeli air campaign, Itamar Ben Gvir, leader of the far-right Jewish Power party, welcomed Israel’s return to “intense fighting” and announced that he would rejoin Netanyahu’s government, bolstering its number of parliamentary votes. But opposition leaders — including Yair Golan, the head of the left-leaning Democrats, the centrist Yair Lapid, and Gadi Eisenkot, a key figure in the center-right National Unity party, challenged Netanyahu’s decision to resume fighting and his motives for doing so. Moreover, they questioned whether the move would doom the chances of freeing the remaining hostages.
The decision also provoked a surge of anger from the families of hostages, who called for more protests. Einav Zangauker, an Israeli mother whose son is one of 24 hostages believed to still be alive in Gaza, accused Netanyahu of favoring “cheap politics over our children, brothers and sisters in captivity” and led demonstrators near the Gaza border, saying she would help form a human chain to block an Israeli ground invasion.
In response, Netanyahu said Tuesday evening that he had refrained for weeks from restarting the Israel Defense Forces offensive against Hamas in hopes that the militant group would compromise during negotiations but that it refused. Now, “military pressure is a necessary condition for the release of the hostages,” he said.
“I hear the commentators claiming that the IDF’s actions are driven by political motives,” Netanyahu said in a recorded video statement. “They have no shame. They are echoing Hamas propaganda.”
Israeli officials said the planning for the strike was underway for weeks, as negotiations between Israel and Hamas showed little signs of progress.
Netanyahu had favored a proposal by President Donald Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, to negotiate for the release of up to 10 living hostages instead of entering a second phase of the ceasefire, as Israel and Hamas had earlier agreed. Under the framework deal reached in January, the second phase would require the return of all Israeli hostages in exchange for an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, the release of Palestinian prisoners and a permanent cessation of hostilities — something Netanyahu vowed he would not accept until Hamas was destroyed.
On Friday, Hamas proposed releasing only one living hostage — the Israeli American dual national Edan Alexander — in an offer that highlighted the size of the gulf between the two sides. Soon after, Netanyahu chose the option of launching the air campaign, which could be ratcheted up in “phases” to include a full-on ground assault, Israeli officials said.
Aaron David Miller, a former U.S. State Department official, said Netanyahu not only was motivated by domestic political considerations but also felt reassured by support from the Trump administration. After Israel launched its strikes, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News that Israel had consulted the United States before the operation and then used a phrase favored by Trump. “All hell will break loose,” she warned Hamas.
“What would’ve been a fight from the Biden administration is now welcomed by Trump,” said Miller, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “At least on Gaza, you have nothing short of a Vulcan mind meld between Trump and Netanyahu.”
By contrast, Netanyahu has found himself at odds with his director of the Shin Bet security service, Ronen Bar, who has argued for putting a priority on the release of hostages over prolonging the war. On Tuesday night, an estimated 40,000 people gathered in Tel Aviv to protest Netanyahu’s decision, announced Sunday, to dismiss Bar.
In recent weeks, the tensions between Bar and Netanyahu spilled dramatically into public view, with Bar’s supporters — who include retired spy chiefs and army generals — and Netanyahu accusing each other of corruption, unethical behavior, disloyalty and blackmail.
Avi Melamed, a former Israeli military intelligence official, said the high-level infighting and mass protests have been ramping up the pressures on Netanyahu but would not deter him. If anything, they motivated him to keep fighting.
“At the end of the day, Netanyahu’s government is hanging by a thread, and it depends on the far right,” he said. “And they have been very clearly pressuring him not to stop the war, but to resume the war.”
Netanyahu returns to war amid mounting political pressure at home | Avi Melamed’s insights quoted in this article by Gerry Shih and Shira Rubin for The Washington Post.
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