Thousands of Israelis gather in front of the Israel’s Ministry of Defense building, holding banners and Israeli flags to protest against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government for not signing the ceasefire agreement with Gaza and to demand hostage swap deal with Palestinians in Tel Aviv, Israel on November 16, 2024 [Mostafa Alkharouf – Anadolu Agency]
Families of Israeli hostages in Gaza threatened legal action on Thursday against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, accusing him of blocking a prisoner swap deal with Palestinians, Anadolu Agency reports.
“We will petition the High Court if you persist in abandoning our loved ones in Hamas captivity,” the families said in a letter to Netanyahu cited by Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth.
The letter accused the Israeli premier of hindering efforts to reach a prisoner exchange agreement with Hamas.
“Refusing to end the war sacrifices the hostages and diminishes their chances of returning alive,” it reads.
On Wednesday, Hamas said that a Gaza cease-fire and prisoner swap has been delayed due to new Israeli conditions.
“The (Israeli) occupation set new issues and conditions related to withdrawal, ceasefire, prisoners, and the return of the displaced, which delayed reaching an agreement that was available,” it added in a statement.
On Tuesday, Netanyahu said that an Israeli negotiating team would return from Qatar for consultations on a potential prisoner exchange deal with Hamas.
Observers, however, view Netanyahu’s announcement as part of a pattern of delays in negotiations.
Since the lone ceasefire in late November 2023, the Israeli premier has hinted at progress in talks for a prisoner swap and a potential cease-fire, only to later insist on continuing military operations in the Gaza Strip.
Netanyahu told The Wall Street Journal last week that the Gaza war will continue “until Hamas is entirely eradicated,” emphasizing Israel’s rejection of Hamas’ presence near its borders.
His Defense Minister Israel Katz also said that Israel will maintain security control in Gaza and establish buffer zones along the border.
Their remarks drew fire from officials in Israel’s negotiating team for jeopardizing talks to reach a Gaza cease-fire and prisoner swap deal with Hamas.
Israel is believed to hold more than 10,300 Palestinian prisoners, while approximately 100 Israeli captives are in Gaza. Hamas has said that dozens of the captives were killed in indiscriminate Israeli airstrikes.
Israel has continued a genocidal war on Gaza that has killed nearly 45,400 people, most of them women and children, since a Hamas attack on 7 October, 2023.
Last month, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
Israel is also facing a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its actions in Gaza.
Demonstration held in support of Palestinians and Lebanese, in London, United Kingdom on November 30, 2024 [Raşid Necati Aslım – Anadolu Agency]
Lizzie Greenwood, a Manchester activist and former Workers’ Party candidate, has been arrested by Greater Manchester Police (GMP) as she recovers from a 35-day hunger strike protesting the UK government’s funding and arming of Israel.
The arrest follows a reported forced entry into a prior residence and harassment of her father at his home.
According to a post on Instagram, GMP also detained five other activists in recent days, who were later released without charge. Despite the absence of evidence, those arrested have had personal belongings, including phones and vehicles, confiscated indefinitely, and face restrictive police curfews.
Activists of Central Manchester for Palestine said these measures are part of an escalating campaign to intimidate and isolate supporters of Palestinian rights.
Greenwood, who began her hunger strike on 27 October and ended it after 35 days, described the protest as a moral obligation. In a previous video posted to her social media, she stated: “This is a cause that I feel willing and obligated to die for.”
She said her strike was driven by a commitment to prevent atrocities similar to the Holocaust. “I will not be made complicit. I object with every fibre of my being. And if it takes my health and my life to make that known, so be it,” stated Greenwood.
Since 5 October, Israel has launched a large-scale ground operation in northern Gaza allegedly to prevent the Palestinian resistance from regrouping. Palestinians, however, accuse Israel of seeking to occupy the area and forcibly displace its residents.
Since then, almost no humanitarian aid, including food, medicine and fuel, has been allowed into the area, leaving most of the population there – currently estimated at 80,000 – on the verge of famine.
Greenwood has accused the UK government of prioritising funding Israel while neglecting British citizens enduring cost of living crises, mental health struggles and housing shortages.
Israel has launched a genocidal war on the Gaza Strip killing more than 44,800 Palestinians, most of them women and children, and injuring over 106,000.
The second year of the genocide in Gaza has drawn growing international condemnation, with officials and institutions labelling the attacks and blocking of aid deliveries as a deliberate attempt to destroy a population.
On 21 November, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and former Defence Minister, Yoav Gallant, for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its deadly war on Gaza.
This work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
UK Foreign Minister David Lammy confirms that UK government and military are active participants in Israel’s genocides and that the F-35 parts that they suspended from supplying to Israel are instead simply diverted via the United States. He says see https://youtu.be/QILgUHrdWREGenocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpA
Smoke rises from buildings after Israeli strikes on Rafah, Gaza on May 6, 2024. (Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib/Anadolu via Getty Images)
“Why?” asked Israeli lawmaker Ofer Cassif. “Because killing Palestinians is more important for the Israeli government than saving Israelis.”
Israel on Monday launched long-awaited strikes on Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip despite Hamas publicly confirming it agreed to a cease-fire and hostage release proposal from Egyptian and Qatari mediators.
The Israel Defense Forces said on social media that “the IDF is currently conducting targeted strikes against Hamas terror targets in eastern Rafah,” the city to which over a million Palestinians have fled since October 7, when Israel launched a retaliatory war that has already killed at least 34,735 people in Gaza and wounded another 78,108.
Earlier Monday, the IDF had dropped leaflets directing residents and refugees in that part of Rafah to relocate to a strip along Gaza’s coast, ignoring warnings from the international community and humanitarian groups that a full-scale Israeli attack on the crowded city would further endanger civilians and relief efforts.
“It is obvious Netanyahu wants this genocidal war to continue indefinitely so that he can remain in power.”
In addition to sparking outrage around the world, the Israeli government’s Rafah attack and rejection of the Hamas-backed proposal was met with criticism from people across Israel. The Associated Press reported that “thousands of Israelis rallied around the country Monday night calling for an immediate deal to release the hostages still held in the Gaza Strip.”
Ofer Cassif, a member of the Knesset who was almost expelled by fellow Israeli lawmakers earlier this year for backing South Africa’s ongoing genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), again called out his own government.
“Israeli tanks and infantry enter east Rafah while planes bomb from above, just hours after Hamas’ decision to accept the hostages/prisoners exchange deal,” Cassif said Monday. “Why? Because killing Palestinians is more important for the Israeli government than saving Israelis. War criminals!”
Well, so much for hostages being the number one priority for Netanyahu. (Never was.) It's all about land grab and cleansing. His cabinet is filled with extremists who have recently used genocidal language against Palestinians. Look at Smotrich and Ben Gvir. Disaster for all. https://t.co/0GU3YeBqAO
The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday that “the War Cabinet unanimously decided this evening Israel will continue its operation in Rafah, in order to apply military pressure on Hamas so as to advance the release of our hostages and achieve the other objectives of the war.”
Along with the prime minister, Israel’s War Cabinet includes Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Benny Gantz, former IDF chief of the general staff, along with three observers.
Netanyahu added that “while the Hamas proposal is far from meeting Israel’s core demands, Israel will dispatch a ranking delegation to Egypt in an effort to maximize the possibility of reaching an agreement on terms acceptable to Israel.”
This stuff doesn't fool anybody anymore. Israel rejected the deal. Netanyahu said so publicly. There's no ruse. https://t.co/3z286o6A1g
Reuters reported that “an Israeli official said the deal was not acceptable to Israel because terms had been ‘softened.’”
According to the news outlet, the first part of a three-phase plan that Hamas—which has controlled Gaza for nearly two decades—agreed to includes a 42-day pause in fighting, the release of 33 hostages held by the group and some Palestinians in Israeli jails, a partial IDF withdrawal, and free movement in the besieged enclave.
Phase two would be “another 42-day period that features an agreement to restore a ‘sustainable calm’ to Gaza, language that an official briefed on the talks said Hamas and Israel had agreed in order to take discussion of a ‘permanent cease-fire’ off the table,” Reuters detailed. This phase also includes withdrawing most Israeli troops and Hamas releasing some soldiers and reservists.
The third phase would involve the exchange of bodies; reconstruction of Gaza overseen by Egypt, Qatar, and the United Nations; and ending the complete blockade on the strip, the outlet added.
Shortly before Israel’s Monday night strikes on Rafah began, Stéphane Dujarric, a spokesperson for United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres, said that the U.N. chief “reiterates his pressing call to both the government of Israel and the leadership of Hamas to go the extra mile needed to make an agreement come true and stop the present suffering.”
Expressing concern about the then-imminent Israeli operation in Rafah, the spokesperson said that “we are already seeing movements of people—many of these people are in desperate humanitarian condition and have been repeatedly displaced. They search safety that has been so many times denied. The secretary-general reminds the parties that the protection of civilians is paramount in international humanitarian law.”
ALL EYES ON RAFAH
Rafah is under bombardment Israel is vowing to proceed with a ground invasion of Rafah 1.5 million displaced Palestinians are trapped with nowhere to go
Demand that Congress pressure Israel to end its assault now!
Other U.N. officials have been warning of what an assault on Rafah will mean for the over 1.4 million Palestinians there, among them 600,000 children. So have humanitarian and political leaders, including U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.)—who on Monday urged President Joe Biden to stand by his earlier position that attacking the city was a “red line” and “end all offensive military aid to Israel.”
Council on American-Islamic Relations national executive director Nihad Awad issued a similar call Monday evening, warning that “the Israeli government is hellbent on using American financial, military, and diplomatic support to ethnically cleanse what remains of Gaza and commit another massacre.”
“President Biden must stand up to Benjamin Netanyahu and take concrete action to end the genocide now,” Awad continued, nodding to the Israeli leader’s legal trouble. The prime minister faces not only potential consequences on a global scale for what the ICJ has deemed a “plausibly” genocidal war on Gaza but also a corruption trial in his own country.
“It is obvious Netanyahu wants this genocidal war to continue indefinitely so that he can remain in power, avoid jail, and fulfill his racist, far-right Cabinet’s demands for the complete destruction of Gaza and the massacre of its people,” Awad said. “It is long past time for President Biden to end our nation’s complicity in this 21st-century genocide.”
Yup. This has been the central issue. He does not care how many more die so long as he gets to sit on his little throne instead of a prison cell. https://t.co/dL7PAuxQlB
Biden spoke with Netanyahu by phone ahead of the IDF strikes on Monday and “reiterated his clear position on Rafah,” according to a White House readout. They also discussed the hostage negotiations, humanitarian aid, the Holocaust, and antisemitism.
Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, also suggested that the Israeli prime minister wants the bloodshed in Gaza to continue for personal reasons.
“Netanyahu does not want an end to the war because the moment the war ends, his political career ends as well. And his prison sentence will commence,” said Parsi. “Yet, Biden has for seven months deferred to Netanyahu.”
