Gantz slams PM for missing Knesset debate on Gaza, then skips Bennett’s speech

Blue and White chairman Benny Gantz railed against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Sunday for his government’s response to the recent escalation in violence emanating from the Gaza Strip, saying the premier’s absence from a Knesset debate on the issue was “an analogy for his leadership at this time.”

After delivering a blistering speech in which he accused Netanyahu of “fleeing from reality,” Gantz himself left the Knesset plenary hall, along with his entire Blue and White faction, as Defense Minister Naftali Bennett stepped up to the podium to respond.

“Benny Gantz is the one that fled today,” Bennett said of the snub, calling it “unbelievable.”

The Blue and White chairman said he and his party members left to travel to the south of Israel to show solidarity with its rocket-bombarded residents.

The past two weeks have seen near-daily rocket and mortar attacks from the Strip, as terrorists in Gaza have also launched dozens of balloon-borne explosive devices into southern Israel.

In his speech, Gantz — a former IDF chief of staff, who oversaw the 2014 Gaza war — said the the residents of the south “can only dream of quiet as you [Netanyahu] ignore the reality. It just doesn’t interest you. It bores you.” That was a reference to an incident last year in which Netanyahu criticized as “boring” a woman who interrupted his speech to protest the closure of a local medical center in northern Israel.

“You don’t even bother to meet with the heads of the local authorities and councils who are bombarded nonstop, but only with those affiliated with the Likud,” Gantz said of Netanyahu’s visit last week to the south of Israel.

“Netanyahu is busy with himself and not the citizens of Israel,” he said, accusing the prime minister of only acting for his own political and legal interests.

The debate, billed as a discussion on the “incessant terrorism from the Gaza Strip,” was called by Blue and White, which collected enough signatures to hold an emergency plenary recess session. But while all Blue and White and a handful of other opposition MKs attended, Bennett was the only representative from the government parties present.

“Because the overwhelming majority of Knesset members have slandered this important meeting and have not arrived, led by the prime minister, my members of the Blue and White faction, and I will leave the plenum to travel to the south,” Gantz concluded, “and I invite all other Knesset members who are interested in joining us and continuing this meeting in the south.”

Taking to the podium as Gantz and the rest of the Blue and White party left the plenum, Bennett accused the former IDF chief of being responsible for the situation in Gaza,

“Benny Gantz is the one who fled from the plenum today, just like that. He had no ability to confront the defense minister in a debate that they themselves had called. This shows that they simply have no ability to enter into a substantive debate,” Bennett said. “They don’t want the debate because it is them, Gantz and [Blue and White No. 3 Moshe] Ya’alon who failed to handle the tunnels during a Protective Edge, failing to manage the 50-day operation and allowing Hamas to flourish in the first place.”

Throughout the fighting in Operation Protective Edge, then-education minister Bennett, also a member of the security cabinet, was an outspoken critic of how Netanyahu, then-defense minister Ya’alon and then-IDF chief of staff Gantz managed the conflict.

Bennett has painted himself as the sole minister to sound the alarm about the impending threat of Hamas tunnels in 2014, only to have those warnings fall on deaf ears.

“When I fought against you, against Bogie [Ya’alon] and Gantz, you hesitated and stuttered and didn’t know what to do and were scared, so they ran away and I took care of it,” Bennett claimed on Monday. “And they run away again today.”

The debate came just hours after Israeli warplanes attacked several targets in the Gaza Strip, several hours after terrorists in the enclave launched a rocket into Israel.

The Israel Defense Forces said warplanes and and other aircraft attacked several targets of the Hamas terror group in southern Gaza, including “a training camp and military infrastructure.” According to Palestinian reports, the IAF hit a site along the beach near Khan Younis in southern Gaza and a Hamas base in Deir el Balah in central Gaza.

The strikes came after incoming rocket sirens sent thousands of Israelis rushing to bomb shelters in the southern town of Sderot and the surrounding area on Sunday night.

On Sunday, Bennett and Netanyahu threatened a harsh military response if attacks from the Gaza Strip continued.

“I want to make this clear: We won’t accept any aggression from Gaza. Just a few weeks ago, we took out the top commander of Islamic Jihad in Gaza, and I suggest that Islamic Jihad and Hamas refresh their memories,” Netanyahu said, at the opening of the weekly cabinet meeting at his office in Jerusalem on Sunday.

“I won’t lay out in detail all our actions and plans in the media, but we’re prepared for crushing action against the terror groups in Gaza. Our actions are powerful, and they’re not finished yet, to put it mildly,” Netanyahu said.

Bennett similarly issued a warning to Hamas leaders in Gaza, warning that Israel would take “lethal action against them” if their “irresponsible behavior” didn’t cease.

“We won’t announce when or where. This action will be very different from those taken in the past. No one will be immune. Hamas faces a choice: choose life and economic prosperity, or choose terror and pay an unbearable price. Their actions will determine [which it will be],” he said.