A member of Israel’s war cabinet has exposed deep internal rifts, criticising the Prime Minister and urging a longer cease-fire with Hamas to free the remaining hostages while saying bluntly that Israel had yet to fully realise its military objectives in Gaza.
“We didn’t topple Hamas,” the cabinet member, Lieutenant General Gadi Eisenkot, told Uvda, an Israeli news programme, in an interview broadcast late on Thursday, adding: “The situation in Gaza is such that the war aims have yet to be achieved.”
General Eisenkot, a retired military chief of staff, is a nonvoting member of Israel’s five-person war cabinet, which has been making many of the most important decisions related to combat in Gaza. He joined Israel’s emergency wartime government, led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, from an Opposition faction after the Hamas-led terror attack.
General Eisenkot’s views carry additional weight because of the personal price he has paid in the war: His 25-year-old son, Master Sergeant Gal Meir Eisenkot, was killed while fighting in Gaza last month, as was a nephew.
The interview laid bare some of the persistent tensions within the emergency government.
General Eisenkot said Netanyahu carried “sharp and clear” responsibility for the country’s failure to protect its citizens on October 7. Netanyahu has generally avoided joining other top officials in taking responsibility for the attack and its aftermath, saying that the time to investigate the failures would come after the war.
The general also said that Israel’s leaders must define a vision for how to wind down the war in Gaza, and for its desired outcome. His comments stood in contrast to statements by other Israeli officials including Netanyahu, who said on Thursday that the war would last for many more months.
General Eisenkot said that only a deal with Hamas could secure further releases of people who were taken hostage in the October 7 attacks. The Israeli authorities say that more than 130 people remain captive in Gaza. “For me, there’s no dilemma,” he said. “The mission is to rescue civilians, ahead of killing an enemy.”
New York Times New Service
