- This story is developing, more to come
Israeli cabinet member Benny Gantz has resigned from Benjamin Netanyahu’s government just weeks after threatening to leave over a possible ceasefire with Hamas.
Gantz, a minister without portfolio, accused Netanyahu in a televised statement of “keeping us from getting closer to a real victory.”
Despite his harsh criticism of the Israeli prime minister, he added: “Leaving the government is a complex and painful decision.”
The statement he made today was postponed after Israel announced that the IDF had rescued four hostages from the Gaza Strip.
In May, he publicly gave Netanyahu a June 8 deadline to draw up a clear day-after plan for what to do with the Gaza Strip once the Middle East’s bloodiest conflict in decades comes to an end.
Netanyahu yesterday called on Gantz not to resign, saying via a Telegram channel: “We must remain united within ourselves in the face of the great tasks ahead. I call on Benny Gantz – do not leave the emergency government. Don’t give up on unity.’
Benny Gantz (pictured) said in a televised statement: “Leaving the government is a complex and painful decision.” Gantz, a minister without portfolio, said in a televised statement: “Leaving the government is a complex and painful decision.”
Benjamin Netanyahu (pictured) ruled out any role for the Palestinian Authority in Gaza, claiming he wanted to hand power to the people living in the enclave
Gantz called for an international, Arab and Palestinian government to govern the Gaza Strip, and was joined at the time by Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
Netanyahu ruled out any role for the Palestinian Authority in Gaza, claiming he wanted to hand power to the people living in the enclave.
He added that he is ruling out such plans until Hamas is defeated, and that he has long opposed Palestinian statehood.
Netanyahu said after Gantz’s ultimatum in May that his political rival’s plan would amount to “a defeat for Israel, abandoning most of the hostages, leaving Hamas intact and establishing a Palestinian state.”
However, Netanyahu added that he still thought the emergency government was important to Israel’s war effort, and that he “expects Gantz to clarify his positions to the public.”
Gantz, the head of the Israel Resilience Party which he founded in 2018, has only six of the 120 seats in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament.
But the centrist party has become a cornerstone of Netanyahu’s already precarious coalition government, which, including the IRP, controls 64, or just over half, of the seats.
Netanyahu may now have to rely on political support from the ultra-nationalist parties that remain in government, whose leaders have angered Israel’s international allies over their extreme positions on what to do in the Gaza Strip.
Gantz announced he was joining the war cabinet shortly after Oct. 7, when Hamas terrorists launched a surprise raid on Israel that killed nearly 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and claimed he was putting aside political differences to help his country.
Hamas took some 250 hostages in the October 7 attack, which killed about 1,200 people.
About half were released in November during a week-long ceasefire.
About 120 hostages remain, of which 43 are dead.
At least 36,700 Palestinians have been killed in the fighting, according to Gaza’s health ministry, which does not distinguish between fighters and civilians.
More to follow.