Retired general: Hamas can’t be defeated unless everything is done to return the hostages

Cnaan Lidor is The Times of Israel's Jewish World reporter

If Israeli hostages remain in Gaza, their presence will be “a burden of weakness for decades,” warns Maj. Gen. (res.) Amos Gilad during the weekly solidarity rally at Tel Aviv’s so-called Hostages Square.

Gilad, who now serves as the executive director of the Institute for Policy and Strategy and previously headed IDF Military Intelligence’s Research Division, says, “No victory is possible over Hamas if it later turns out that not everything possible was done to retrieve them.”

“An exchange is a matter of national security, and your presence here at the rally is paramount to achieving it,” says Gilad.

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