From the Liveblog of
Tuesday, March 19, 2024
Gantz: ‘Everyone in national leadership before Oct.7 bears responsibility for the disaster’
Sam Sokol is the Times of Israel's political correspondent. He was previously a reporter for the Jerusalem Post, Jewish Telegraphic Agency and Haaretz. He is the author of "Putin’s Hybrid War and the Jews"
War cabinet minister Benny Gantz faults the political leadership for last year’s devastating Hamas attack on Israel, declaring during a speech in Sderot that “all of us, everyone who was in the national leadership before October 7, bears responsibility for the disaster.”
“The government that I joined in light of the state of emergency has a broad, binding and tremendous responsibility for the past, but also for the present and the future that will be derived from it,” he says, calling the release of the hostages a “moral imperative” as well as a “strategic necessity.”
“The State of Israel has a responsibility to its citizens. This covenant must not be broken, even at painful costs. As with the last time we negotiated, if there is a real opportunity to bring them back, we will take it,” he pledges.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has faced criticism for his refusal to take responsibility for October 7, while virtually all other military and civilian leaders who had a hand in events have done so.
Appearing to contradict the premier, who has said that postwar civil affairs in Gaza will be run by “local officials” who have “administrative experience, Gantz asserts that “establishing a regional international administration for Gaza is now an operational necessity.”
He also appears to take a veiled jab at the prime minister on the issue of ultra-Orthodox military enlistment, declaring that “the thought that it is possible to give up the ‘people’s army’ collapsed on October 7.”
“The time has come for the majority of the Haredim to enlist in the military,” he declares, adding, “If we give up now on a new Israeli service outline… we will harm the security of the state, and we will miss an opportunity to solve an issue that is tearing Israeli society apart.”
“Our desire is to reach agreements [to the issue of Haredi military service] but the agreements must bring a solution to the security, social and national challenge. Not just a solution to a political challenge. They must promote a solution for recruitment, not an exemption from recruitment,” he says.
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