Netanyahu: Return of hostages important, but war’s ‘supreme goal’ is victory over enemies
Hostages’ families accuse PM of ‘falling in line with Smotrich,’ as Herzog says Israel ‘can’t celebrate independence with a whole heart’ while captives still in Gaza
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Thursday that “victory” over Hamas, not the return of the hostages, was the supreme objective of the war in Gaza, provoking anger from captives’ families.
The controversy came as hostages’ families in recent days accused Netanyahu of sabotaging a potential truce-hostage deal and withholding information about the remaining 59 captives.
Speaking at the annual Independence Day Bible Contest in Jerusalem, Netanyahu said Israel has “many goals, many goals in this war. We want to bring all our hostages home. We’ve so far brought back 147 alive, and 196 total.”
“There are another up to 24 alive, 59 total, and we want to return the living and the dead,” said the premier, whose wife on Monday said the number of living hostages was lower than the official figure cited by her husband.
“It’s a very important goal,” Netanyahu continued, but then added, “The war has a supreme goal, and the supreme goal is victory over our enemies, and this we will achieve.”
Netanyahu has hitherto highlighted the destruction of Hamas, the return of all the hostages, and ensuring that Gaza cannot constitute a future threat to Israel as the three goals of the war, without ranking these goals. He has also repeatedly stressed that the war will continue until “absolute victory” in achieved.
His comment sparked outrage among hostages’ families, with the Hostages and Missing Families Forum accusing Netanyahu of “falling in line” with Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who last week triggered a fierce backlash after he said that “the hostages are not the most important thing” in the war effort.
Responding to Netanyahu’s statement, the Forum said: “The majority of the Israeli public… wants the return of all the hostages before anything else,” and called the captives’ return “the supreme goal that should be guiding Israel’s government.”
Alluding to Independence Day, it said: “There is no full independence for the state or for the people of Israel without the return of our brothers and sisters.”
Meanwhile, President Isaac Herzog said at a ceremony in his official residence in Jerusalem on Thursday that Israel “cannot celebrate independence with a whole heart when our brothers and sisters are not with us. Israel as a nation longs for them, for their freedom.”
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum has repeatedly assailed Netanyahu for refusing to end the war in Gaza as part of a deal with Hamas to free the captives. Israel rejected one such offer this week. Smotrich and fellow far-right minister Itamar Ben Gvir have threatened to topple the government if Israel ends the fighting in Gaza.
Ben Gvir had temporarily quit the government after Israel in January signed a truce-hostage deal that saw Hamas release 33 women, children, civilian men over 50 and those deemed “humanitarian cases,” in exchange for some 1,900 Palestinian prisoners, including over 270 serving life terms in connection with the murders of dozens of Israelis.
The deal’s 42-day first phase expired on March 2 amid Netanyahu’s refusal to negotiate the potential second phase, which would have required a full IDF withdrawal from Gaza. Israel renewed hostilities in the Strip on March 18, after which Ben Gvir returned to the government.
The deal’s second phase would have seen Hamas release 24 hostages still thought to be alive — all of them young men abducted on October 7, 2023, when thousands of Hamas-led terrorists stormed southern Israel to kill some 1,200 people and take 251 hostages, sparking the war in Gaza. Terror groups in the Strip are also holding the remains of 35 hostages, including a soldier killed fighting in the 2014 Gaza war.
The Times of Israel Community.