Foreign Affairs

The Walls Are Closing In On Benjamin Netanyahu — And There’s No Easy Way Out

(Flickr/Official State Department photo by Chuck Kennedy)

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is finding himself stuck in an increasingly difficult situation with the war in Gaza, one that presents no clear way out and threatens to jeopardize his hold on the country’s highest office.

Revelations broke out on Sunday that six hostages in Gaza had been killed by Hamas, prompting widespread anger across Israel and demands that Netanyahu accept a ceasefire agreement to free the remaining hostages. Netanyahu is faced with two options — accept a ceasefire agreement and risk being ousted from power by those in his cabinet who have promised to do so, or continue the war and risk further angering the Israeli people and the West, who have made louder and louder calls for a ceasefire.

“This is a very, very complicated situation and anyone who is arguing that this is an easy decision either has no idea what they’re talking about or is gaslighting,” Jason Brodsky, policy director at United Nuclear Against Iran, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Israel’s government is confronted with a witch’s brew of choices, and it’s an incredibly difficult decision to make.”

The news of the hostages’ deaths — one of whom was an American — sparked massive protests and strikes across Israel, in some of the largest demonstrations seen since the country’s war against Hamas began on Oct. 7, the date when Hamas invaded Israel and killed 1,200 people. The Israeli public’s call for a ceasefire and hostage release deal has reached a climax, with anger being directed at Netanyahu for not reaching an agreement.

So too has the Biden administration called on Netanyahu to accept a ceasefire deal under the framework currently being drawn up by U.S. negotiators, which includes an initial halt in fighting between Israel and Hamas in exchange for the release of hostages followed by a longer, more sustainable ceasefire, assuming both sides agree. The news of the six hostage deaths in Gaza added fuel to the administration’s push to get a deal done.

President Joe Biden has been increasingly at odds with Netanyahu over disagreements on the war and a possible ceasefire. Upon returning to the White House after a two-week vacation, Biden told reporters on Monday that the prime minister is not doing enough to reach a deal.

Netanyahu during an interview on Thursday appeared to dismiss claims that a deal will be reached in short order, calling the notion “exactly inaccurate.”

“There’s a story, a narrative out there that there’s a deal out there,” Netanyahu told Fox News on Thursday, arguing that Hamas’ terms for a deal were too unreasonable.

A major sticking point of the current proposal is that Netanyahu wants to leave some Israeli forces along the southern Gaza border, arguing that it would prevent Hamas from smuggling weapons into the region through Egypt. Netanyahu got into an unprecedented shouting match with his head of defense last week over disagreements on the matter, according to Israeli officials who spoke to Axios.

“There’s no shortage of points that might wind up unraveling negotiations,” Justin Logan, director of defense at the CATO Institute, told the DCNF, noting that it may have been politically wise for Netanyahu to drive to focus on the border issue, given that it puts emphasis on the danger Hamas poses. “I think by saying, ‘Look, we can’t agree to a ceasefire, because it would leave open this door through which Hamas could be resupplied again,’ that’s a reasonable political argument.”

But the Biden administration is not in favor of Israeli forces remaining along that border in the long term. White House spokesman John Kirby told reporters on Monday that he wasn’t “going to get into a debate with the Prime Minister” about the matter, noting that the framework Israel agreed to in May includes the withdrawal of all forces from the border.

Hamas has also said that any Israeli presence along the border or anywhere else in Gaza would be an obstacle to a ceasefire agreement. The terrorist group has repeatedly sent negotiations into a spiral with challenging demands, even as hostages continue to be killed or die under its watch.

“The focus is on Benjamin Netanyahu as if he is the only person who holds the keys here to release the hostages. And that’s a dangerous dynamic because it puts no agency on Hamas,” Brodsky told the DCNF. “As much as my Israeli friends are hurting and want to express their displeasure with the prime minister, there’s a caveat here, and that is that our enemies listen to the news. They’re watching these scenes playing out, and they are sitting back and letting the United States put more pressure on Israel while trying to evade the spotlight for their crimes.”

WATCH 🚨

REPORTER: “Mr. President Do you think Netanyahu is doing enough?”

BIDEN: “No” pic.twitter.com/4Pbfbo75R5

— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) September 2, 2024

Though a full-scale ceasefire has been the long-time goal of the West, Netanyahu could be risking his political career if he agrees to such a deal. Certain members of Netanyahu’s cabinet have vowed to resign if he accepts a deal that ends the fighting — as outlined by Biden in May — which would effectively topple Netanyahu’s government and remove him from power, according to CNN.

One minister, Bezalel Smotrich, “made it clear” to Netanyahu in June that he would not be “part of a government that will agree to the proposed outline and end the war without destroying Hamas and returning all the hostages,” according to CNN.

Netanyahu’s coalition currently maintains a 64-seat majority in the country’s 120-seat parliament, according to Reuters. His largest faction and own party inside the coalition, the Likud part, holds 32 seats.

The prime minister also has problems completely separate from the Israel-Hamas war. He instituted sweeping judicial reforms in September 2023, which were deeply unpopular among the Israeli public and largely overturned in the country’s Supreme Court in early 2024.

Netanyahu is additionally still facing a number of corruption allegations currently being deliberated in court.

Combined with his low approval rating and problems prior to the war, Netanyahu’s inability to take action in regard to the conflict or a ceasefire without angering some in Israel or the West puts him in an incredibly challenging position that threatens his future as prime minister, Michael DiMino, an executive at Defense Priorities and former CIA official, told the DCNF.

“Probably not,” DiMino told the DCNF when asked whether Netanyahu was likely to survive politically. “And this has been something that others and I have assessed from the beginning of the conflict. It was already looking pretty dire before Oct. 7, and so a lot of this has just been on hold, given the conflict, and now I think what you’re seeing is potentially a large segment of the Israeli populace that is fatigued by the war. I don’t think Netanyahu, whether he accepts a deal or not, is going to be around long, politically speaking.”

For the time being, there does not seem to be a clear track toward a ceasefire, though negotiations between the major players including the U.S., Israel, Egypt, Qatar and Hamas are continuing. It’s entirely possible that even if Netanyahu wasn’t under the threat of being ousted by those in his cabinet, he still wouldn’t push for a full-scale ceasefire, Logan told the DCNF.

“We all attribute the resistance in Jerusalem to a ceasefire to these ministers who made a statement saying they’ll collapse the government were one to happen. But it does raise the question whether, if they didn’t make that statement, whether Netanyahu would even want the ceasefire in that event,” Logan said.

Privately the Biden administration is reportedly growing concerned that Hamas isn’t willing to agree to any ceasefire deal, even if Israel is ready for one. The administration has recently been planning to put forward a “take it or leave it” proposal in a bid to secure a ceasefire quickly, but that plan has been put indefinitely on hold following Hamas’ abrupt demand that more Palestinian prisoners be released than what was previously agreed to.

The Biden administration’s efforts to end the war have yielded virtually no results because they were too weak or misguided to be effective, experts told the DCNF. Privately the Biden administration is reportedly growing concerned that Hamas isn’t willing to agree to any ceasefire deal, even if Israel is ready for one.

“The Biden administration has clearly shown that it cannot solve the problem. And perhaps it’s possible that there may not be an American solution to the problem,” Logan told the DCNF.

“Washington has not shown the vim and vigor necessary to put pressure on any of these respective actors where it really would have mattered most, DiMino said. “It’s not really a shining example of global leadership from the United States.”