Posted by | Netanyahu against the world, Daily Sensemaker. |
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| Tens of thousands of Israelis answered a call yesterday by opposition leaders to take to the streets after recovery overnight of six more bodies of hostages kidnapped by Hamas on October 7. Israel’s army said they had been murdered by their captors. So what? The crowds are against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but the showdown only underlines his grip on an Israeli government consumed by fighting on three fronts excluding the home front. That is – in Gazaacross its northern border in Lebanon with Hezbollahand now facing a lethal crisis in the West Bank. No deal. A general strike has been called for today by Histadrut, Israel’s equivalent of the TUC, to protest Netanyahu’s failure to secure a ceasefire and hostage release deal which it says could have prevented the deaths. How come? It’s thought the hostages were alive until very recently. Their bodies were recovered in a Rafah tunnel two days after Netanyahu overrode his own defence minister, Yoav Gallant, by getting an otherwise supine cabinet to impose a condition on the hostage negotiations – a continued presence for Israeli troops (the IDF) after any ceasefire on the Gaza-Egypt border – even though Hamas had already rejected the idea and Gallant sees it as unnecessary for now. The IDF’s initial assessment is that the six dead captives – one of whom, Hersh Goldberg-Polin, was a US citizen – could have been murdered as their captors fled what they feared were approaching troops. If so they could have been freed alive had Netanyahu agreed a deal at any point in recent weeks.Netanyahu now faces fresh outrage from the hostage families at a time when polls show 53 percent of Israelis want a hostage deal including a ceasefire and withdrawal of troops from Gaza. West Bank. This has overshadowed – but not de-escalated – a fresh outbreak of violence in the occupied West Bank: At least 16 Palestinians—mainly militants – were killed in Jenin, Tulkarem and the Jordan Valley refugee camp of al Far’a all in the northern West Bank late last week;Palestinian militants deployed separate car bombs in two attacks in the southern West Bank late on Friday, injuring three Israeli soldiers and a security guard and killing the Palestinian drivers;Israeli security forces launched a manhunt after three Israeli policemen were shot dead at the Al Tarquimia checkpoint close to Hebron. Violence has escalated in the West Bank since the start of the Gaza war – and at least partly because of it. 622 Palestinians, many of them militants in urban raids like those last week but including 145 women and minors, have been killed in the West Bank since October 7, according to Anera, an American NGO.The Israeli Security Agency says 24 Israelis, most thought to be settlers, have been killed in the same period. But settler violence against mainly unarmed Palestinians has also sharply increased with 1,250 attacks, emptying some villages in the rural West Bank and causing 120 fatalities and injuries, Anera says. Right flank. The two crises are linked, not least in Netanyahu’s cabinet. His two most extreme ministers, Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, on whom his coalition currently depends, have promoted relentless West Bank settlement expansion in contravention of international law while also adamantly opposing a Gaza hostage deal. The question now is whether Netanyahu can, even so, be persuaded to go for a hostage deal ahead of the goal he craves – the killing of the Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar. He may feel no need to compromise: He still enjoys a solid 64-strong Knesset majority (63 if Gallant were to defect).His previously dismal poll ratings have improved, largely because of Iran-related issues including Tehran’s threat to retaliate for Israel’s assassination of the Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in July. If domestic agitation doesn’t work, will external pressure? Joe Biden says the US is still working intensively for a deal. US ambassador Jack Law told a hostage vigil in Tel Aviv yesterday: “We have to get this done.” But if the past is any guide, that doesn’t mean it will be. What’s more… The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry says 40,738 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since October 7. |
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Who Watches the Watchers? 