Gantz: Netanyahu lied to public, won’t bring the hostages home

National Unity party leader Benny Gantz accuses Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of getting in the way of hostage deals throughout the war, and worrying primarily about his political survival.

Gantz says Netanyahu lied to the public yesterday when he laid out his case for why maintaining a military presence in the Philadelphi Corridor should trump reaching a hostage deal with Hamas.

“The prime minister did not look the public in the eye and tell the truth: That he won’t bring the hostages home, he won’t truly protect the south, he won’t return the residents of the north to their homes, he won’t prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon,” he says in a televised address.

Gantz says he is not surprised, since during his time in the war cabinet, Netanyahu consistently got in the way of progress toward hostage deals, including around the week-long deal that eventually took place in November. He also criticizes Netanyahu’s battle planning, saying the prime minister “hesitated” and thus thwarted what would have been the earlier expansion of the war to Khan Younis and later to Rafah. “And when we wanted to open a corridor on the Morag Route in order to quickly tackle the southern [Gaza] front, without the diplomatic complications of the Philadelphi Corridor, Netanyahu refused.”

He claims that Netanyahu has refused to make the swift, safe return of residents to northern Israel a goal of the war.

“It doesn’t surprise me because Netanyahu is focused on political survival, and harms our strategic ties with the United States while Iran is progressing toward a nuclear weapon,” he says.

“We must bring back the hostages,” says Gantz, “even at a very heavy price.”