Earlier this week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that he hoped to make an announcement regarding the hostages “in a day or so.”
Not surprisingly, given that only 20 of the remaining 59 hostages remain alive, the statement raised the hopes of the hostages’ families, including those who simply wished to have their family members receive a proper burial.
Yet shortly after what seemed to be a promise by the prime minister, his office issued a statement in the name of a so-called senior official that Netanyahu’s statement was not meant literally. Instead, the statement averred, “the prime minister meant that we will not give up on freeing the hostages, and if we don’t achieve that, hopefully in the coming days, we will achieve it later on.” Not surprisingly, the families of the hostages were furious.
It is far from clear how late “later on” is. Israel has now been at war with Hamas for more than 19 months. Dozens of hostages have died. And, as Netanyahu’s backtracking implicitly acknowledged, there is no immediate prospect for the remaining living hostages to be freed.
Indeed, it is not at all evident that Netanyahu prioritizes freeing the hostages. On the contrary, he recently stated that bringing the hostages home is “a very important goal,” but “the war has a supreme goal, and the supreme goal is victory over our enemies, and this we will achieve.”
Previously, winning the war and freeing the hostages had both been primary goals. Evidently that is no longer the case.
It is also noteworthy that Maj. Gen. David Zini — Netanyahu’s choice to replace Ronen Bar, whom he fired as chief of Israel’s internal security service — reportedly told his military colleagues, “I am against hostage deals. This is an eternal war.” The ousted Bar, like many in Israel’s military leadership, had been a strong proponent of a ceasefire in order to obtain the release of at least some of the remaining living hostages.
Zini’s purported description of the war with Hamas as “eternal” evokes echoes of America’s “forever wars” in Afghanistan and Iraq. Relative to the duration of Israel’s previous armed conflicts, the Gaza operation is indeed a forever war. If that were not the case, Hamas should have been defeated months ago.
It appears that the only way Israel can truly defeat Hamas is if it succeeds in driving the entire population out of Gaza. Indeed, Netanyahu’s security cabinet, echoing President Trump’s suggestion, approved a plan to organize a “voluntary transfer” for Gaza residents to move to third countries. And Jerusalem’s policy of restricting humanitarian aid to the enclave appears intended to encourage “volunteers” to leave.
The vast majority of Gazans show no interest in leaving their homes, however. And Israel’s bombing attacks continue, resulting in the deaths of thousands of Gazans, including women and children. Whether Hamas is accurately reporting the numbers of dead is less important than the reality of the destruction that Israel continues to wreak upon the Gaza Strip and its inhabitants. There is no clear end in sight, nor is there any indication that either the living and dead hostages will be released any time soon, unless Netanyahu does an about face and accepts an American-negotiated ceasefire.
Israel appears to have rejected the latest Hamas offer for a limited ceasefire in exchange for five living and 10 dead hostages. Washington is now proposing the release of 10 living and 18 dead hostages in exchange for a 60-day truce and the resumption of U.N. humanitarian aid. However, Jerusalem has consistently blamed Hamas for undermining any deal by refusing to give up its weapons, accept that its leadership go into exile and demanding that Israel not resume fighting once a ceasefire took place. For its part, Hamas has demanded that Israel withdraw all its forces from Gaza. Both sides have refused to budge. In the meantime, more hostages suffer at the hands of their captors, while Gazans, and indeed Israeli soldiers, continue to die.
Israel is not about to withdraw from Gaza to satisfy Hamas’s demands. In any event, even if the Netanyahu government were to agree not to recommence hostilities with Hamas after a ceasefire, it would still have every opportunity to do so, since it could claim it was responding to renewed rocket attacks emanating from Islamic Jihad with Hamas’s tacit approval
Yet Israel’s own ceasefire conditions also seem unrealistic. Even were Hamas to agree to disarm, it is not clear how Israel could ensure that it do so. Rebel movements have a way of hiding their weapons even in the face of the most intense harassment. Similarly, if Hamas agreed to exile its leaders — and since the death of Mohammed Sinwar, it is uncertain who those leaders even are — exile would not prevent them from managing terrorism from afar.
In the meantime, more of Israel’s allies and friends, notably German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and even President Trump, are becoming increasingly critical of its relentless attacks. In addition, Britain has called off negotiations to expand free trade with Israel, while the EU appears on the verge of reviewing its economic ties with the Jewish State.
Netanyahu has admitted that international pressure forced him to allow humanitarian aid to enter Gaza — though even in that case, many are questioning the means and process by which Israel actually is distributing that aid. Perhaps the prime minister will soon also find himself under an unprecedented level of economic pressure to agree to a ceasefire. Should Netanyahu continue to resist that pressure, he may cause his country such serious economic damage that it will take decades to have a hope of anything like a complete recovery.
Dov S. Zakheim is a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and vice chairman of the board for the Foreign Policy Research Institute. He was undersecretary of Defense (comptroller) and chief financial officer for the Department of Defense from 2001 to 2004 and a deputy undersecretary of Defense from 1985 to 1987.
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