PM’s office re-releases denial of NYT report claiming Netanyahu thwarted Gaza truce deals to preserve coalition

By Sam Sokol 12 July 2025, 9:10 pm

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Sam Sokol is a former political correspondent at The Times of Israel. 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"

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, right, and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich in the Knesset, February 7, 2024. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90/File)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office re-releases a statement denying a July 11 New York Times report that claimed he prolonged the war against Hamas in order to stay in power, arguing that it “defames Israel, its brave people and soldiers, and its prime minister.”

According to the report, Netanyahu deliberately extended the Gaza war to serve his own political goals of rehabilitating his domestic image and staying in power.

Among the actions listed in the report were Netanyahu’s shelving of a Gaza truce deal that would have secured the release of at least 30 hostages due to a threat by far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich to bring down the government. He also allegedly derailed a White House effort to secure Israeli-Saudi normalization conditional on ending the Gaza war due to opposition by National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir.

The report also said Netanyahu informed senior Haredi lawmaker Moshe Gafni about Israel’s plans to attack Iran three days before the June 13 opening strike, in a bid to dissuade Gafni from toppling the government over its failure to codify yeshiva students’ exemption from military service.

The Prime Minister’s Office deleted a statement it released overnight, but has now released it again after the end of Shabbat. It argues that the Times report “rehashes long discredited claims of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s political opponents,” and declares that Netanyahu and his cabinet’s strategic decisions “led Israel to one of the greatest military comebacks in history.”

In addition, the PMO insists there was “no viable deal last year” and that when Netanyahu “achieved hostage release deals he deemed acceptable, he pushed them through even when his coalition partners voted against them and bolted the government.”