Israeli opposition politicians and former hostages on Tuesday condemned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s decision to launch fresh strikes on Gaza, leaving the ceasefire deal with Hamas in tatters. The strikes have killed more than 400 people already, Gaza’s Health Ministry said.
The “vast majority of Israeli citizens” feel “a deep lack of trust in someone who is dragging Israel back into fighting,” opposition leader Yair Lapid said of Netanyahu in an X
post Tuesday.
“Our brave soldiers deserve a prime minister they can trust, whose sole focus is the security of the country and the fate of the hostages,” he wrote. “That is not the case today.”
Yair Golan, leader of the left-wing opposition party The Democrats and a former deputy chief of staff for the Israel Defense Forces,
accused Netanyahu of “using the lives of our citizens and soldiers because he is trembling with fear” following public outcry over
reports that he plans to dismiss Israel’s domestic intelligence chief, Ronen Bar, who has called for prioritizing the return of all Israeli hostages over continuing the war. Golan also called for protests to continue.
Freed hostages and relatives of those still held in Gaza also criticized the resumption of strikes.
“My heart is broken, shattered, and disappointed,” Emily Damari, an Israeli-British hostage who was
freed during the ceasefire earlier this year, wrote in an
Instagram story. Addressing the remaining hostages, she wrote: “We will continue to fight non-stop and do everything we can to bring you back.”
Liri Albag,
an Israeli soldier who was released at the beginning of the recent ceasefire, wrote on
Instagram: “What about those who were left behind? Have they been forgotten again?”
“It’s impossible to move on while they’re rotting in hell,” Albag wrote.
“Netanyahu has decided to murder our hostages,” Einav Zangauker, whose son Matan is
one of 24 hostages believed to still be alive in Gaza, said on
Facebook. She accused the prime minister of prioritizing his far-right allies who opposed the ceasefire “over our children who are in captivity” and of “violating the agreement and planning a return to war — a war that will kill the hostages.”
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum said in a statement Tuesday that it was “shocked, outraged, and deeply distressed by the deliberate shattering of the process to bring our loved ones home from Hamas’s horrific captivity.”
