Nick Mordowanec
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should not be in power following the conclusion of the war in Gaza, according to a new survey of his own people.
Netanyahu was resounding in his conviction following Hamas' October 7 attack on Israel, declaring war on the Palestinian militant group and prompting Israel's heaviest-ever airstrikes on Gaza. Israeli officials have said that 1,200 people were killed in Hamas' assault, according to the Associated Press, while the Gaza Ministry of Health says more than 21,900 Palestinians have died in the conflict.
On Monday, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced that thousands of troops would be redeployed from the Gaza Strip while some reservists would return home to their families and jobs as soon as this week. The decision has been linked to the negative economic effects of Israelis leaving their job to fight the war while also causing some to assume that a shift in strategy may encompass a wider region to properly fend off attacks and escalation from Lebanon's Iran-backed Hezbollah.
A poll of 605 men and women taken between December 25 and 28 and published on Tuesday by the Israel Democracy Institute (IDI) shows that 85 percent of Israelis want 74-year-old Netanyahu, who has served as prime minister three different times since 1996, to hand over control to someone new when the war ends.
Benny Gantz, a retired army general and former defense minister who is currently serving alongside Netanyahu in the war cabinet, received 23 percent of support. About 30.5 percent of respondents did not provide a preferred candidate.
In a Christmas Day op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, Netanyahu offered three "prerequisites for peace" in Gaza between Israelis and Palestinians: Hamas must be destroyed, Gaza must be demilitarized, and Palestinian society must be deradicalized.
"Once Hamas is destroyed, Gaza is demilitarized and Palestinian society begins a deradicalization process, Gaza can be rebuilt and the prospects of a broader peace in the Middle East will become a reality," he said.
One day later, he promised that Hamas militants are being consistently observed and will be found.
"We are continuing the war, deepening the fighting in the southern Gaza Strip and elsewhere," Netanyahu said in a video address posted on social media. "We fight to the end."
Of those Israelis surveyed, more than 56 percent said that continued fighting against Hamas is the best way to bring about the recovery of Israeli hostages. Just 24 percent were in favor of releasing all the Palestinian prisoners held by Israel in return for the release of all the hostages, "even if this means agreeing to Hamas's demand to halt the fighting."
Respondents also expressed antipathy towards the United States' role in pushing for certain military conditions, including a ceasefire. Rhetoric and protests across the U.S. have escalated since October 7, with calls from politicians and participants of organized movements in city streets and on college campuses, scrutinizing military bombardment in Gaza due to the increasing numbers of civilian casualties—many of whom are children.
Approximately 38.3 percent of respondents said Israel "certainly should not" heed U.S. demands and shift its military strategy to a "different phase" of the war to reduce heavy bombing in densely populated areas. About 28 percent of respondents think Israel should not go that route.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Tel Aviv on December 31, 2023. A new poll found that 15 percent of Israelis want Netanyahu to remain in his current position.
Aaron David Miller, an American Middle East analyst and senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said on CNN on Monday that Netanyahu realizes that his political future is at risk when the fighting diminishes.
People like Gantz and others who currently compose this emergency cabinet, such as the head of Israeli military intelligence, will likely leave sometime this year and either form a new government or have open elections, he added.
"There's no mechanism to remove the prime minister...Right now I don't think this prime minister is going anywhere," Miller said. "He knows that his political future means a successful prosecution of this war and, frankly, a longer war."
About 51 percent of those surveyed also want their military to retaliate strongly against Hezbollah, saying that Israel "should deal Hezbollah a heavy blow now, even at the cost of opening up another front in the north."
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