from Politico
Israeli leader’s war cabinet wants a cease-fire to secure the return of hostages, but his Likud party wants unrelenting war.
As he tries to cling to power, Benjamin Netanyahu is being buffeted by contradictory demands over the direction of the war in Gaza. His war cabinet is increasingly urging a cease-fire deal to be struck with Hamas — to secure the return of Israeli hostages — while lawmakers in his own Likud party are pushing in the opposite direction and pressing for military operations to remain unrelenting.
Unable to square the circle, the Israeli leader appears to have chosen to postpone decisions about the direction of the war, but it is doubtful they can be delayed for much longer. A public groundswell is starting to build for military operations to be put on hold and for a cease-fire to be reached with Hamas for the release of more than a hundred Israelis still being held in Gaza.
There’s rising alarm about the captives’ treatment and the conditions they are enduring. Thousands of Israelis took to the streets over the weekend calling for the hostages to be prioritized over the military campaign. And in a television interview Thursday, a war cabinet minister, Gadi Eisenkot, a former and highly popular chief of staff of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), warned the only way to save hostages in the near term is through a deal even if that comes at a high price.
Eisenkot, whose 25-year-old son and 19-year-old nephew died fighting in Gaza in December, also appeared to criticize Netanyahu’s management of the war with Hamas, suggesting the Israeli leadership is not telling the Israeli public the truth about the conflict and that talk of destroying Hamas is over-blown. A complete victory over the militant group is unrealistic, he said...
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