Is Netanyahu trying to expand the Gaza war to prolong his rule?

Most Israelis do not want the prime minister to continue in office and favour holding elections as soon as the war ends

Sebastien Thibault

As the scale of Israel’s destruction of Gaza deepens, action in Iran and Lebanon increases the risk of the conflict widening at the behest of a desperate Netanyahu.

Is Netanyahu trying to expand the Gaza war to prolong his rule?

Omer Onhon

last update on 07 Jan 2024

The assassination of top-level Hamas leaders has come alongside an intensification of Israel’s war on the Gaza Strip, where the destruction and human tragedy continue unabated.

Deadly blasts in Iran killed more senior figures after the deaths in Lebanon, including Saleh al-Arouri, one of the most senior in the organisation.

The latest strikes during a commemoration for Qasem Soleimani – the top-level Iranian figure killed by a US drone in 2020 – have increased international tension across the region.

They are widely seen as the work of Israel after its Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared the country’s secret services would hunt down Hamas’ leadership and its allies.

Iran and Turkey

Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi postponed a visit to Turkey after the attack for the second time. He was due to make the trip the day after the blast. The two neighbouring nations have a nuanced, cordial, and distrustful relationship. But they both share an anger at Israel’s war on Gaza.

The prospect of a more profound understanding between Tehran and Ankara will unnerve not only Tel Aviv but also other capitals across the region and the wider world, as Israel’s actions complicate the ongoing war’s wider repercussions.

The prospect of a more profound understanding between Tehran and Ankara will unnerve not only Tel Aviv but also other capitals across the region and the wider world.

Lebanon

Meanwhile, similar aggression on Lebanon's soil runs the risk of drawing it further into a conflict that is at more risk of spreading with every assassination. Four Hezbollah members were killed in an overnight Israeli airstrike in south Lebanon, bringing the death toll since October to 151 and making Beirut a de facto part of the war.

The conflict is deepening in Gaza and may widen in the region for two main reasons.

Firstly, Netanyahu's declared goal of destroying Hamas to ensure Israel's security is not easy to achieve. He has said that "victory over Hamas would take months".

Secondly, there is no clarity on the administrative and security arrangements that could be implemented when the war ends. Many ideas are being suggested, but none seem solid enough to offer a way out of the fighting in Gaza.

How Gaza will be governed when the guns fall silent is the primary issue and the most difficult one. It involves many challenges, each one of which is unacceptable to one side or the other.

In recent weeks, policy gaps between the US and Israel have emerged, both on the scope and nature of Israeli military operations in Gaza and what should come next after this conflict is over.

Netanyahu on the brink

As the violence continues and the risk of it spreading deepens, Netanyahu is killing Gazans, regardless of their affiliation or lack of it with Hamas. But he is simultaneously becoming the author of his own political destruction while also jeopardising the future of his country.

Propaganda in the form of claims that he is de-radicalising Gaza comes from a leader who himself is at the head of the most right-wing government in the history of Israel.

Netanyahu has set the scene for a golden age of Zionist radicalism even before his wholesale destruction of Gaza, which actually created the perfect conditions for radicalising its brutalised people.

Hamas' attacks on 7 October were terrible and tragic. It is also clear that Israel's subsequent revenge war on Gaza has caused monumental suffering and humiliation of its people, making the radicalisation Netanyahu claims to stand against more likely to occur.

Israel's revenge war on Gaza has caused monumental suffering and humiliation of its people, making the radicalisation Netanyahu claims to stand against more likely to occur.

Losing hearts and minds

Israel may be effective in the physical destruction of Gaza, but in all other senses, it is losing.

It is conducting war in a very densely civilian-populated area. It is targeting civilians, hospitals and residential neighbourhoods and causing displacement of hundreds of thousands of people. These are all clear violations of international law.

Nation states have the right to ensure their territory's security and defend themselves, but this right doesn't give it carte blanche. There are rules.

Israel has failed to comply with international humanitarian law as Netanyahu's so-called fight against terrorism has turned into an operation to obliterate Gaza and perhaps even Palestinians as a whole.

A second Nakba in the form of ethnic cleansing is in the making.

Left: Palestinians fleeing their homes in 1948 after the creation of the state of Israel. Right: Palestinians flee from northern Gaza to the south after the Israeli army issued an unprecedented evacuation warning on 13 October 2023

Ethnic cleansing

Netanyahu's far-right coalition partners have embraced the idea of resettlement of Palestinians from Gaza and has become an option on which the Israeli government is working.

Israel's press has reported that within the framework of what they call a "voluntary resettlement scheme", the government is conducting secret contacts with several countries and trying to cut deals with them to have Palestinians from Gaza settle on their lands. One of the countries that was openly mentioned was Congo.

Israel's Intelligence Minister Gila Gamliel is reported to have justified the idea of resettlement on the basis that "at the end of the war, Hamas rule in Gaza will collapse, there will be no municipal authorities, the civilian population will be entirely dependent on humanitarian aid, there will be no work, and 60% of Gaza's agricultural land will become security buffer zones."

Israel has failed to comply with international humanitarian law as Netanyahu's so-called fight against terrorism has turned into an operation to obliterate Gaza and perhaps even Palestinians as a whole.

Echoes from history

These approaches are reminiscent of Nazi campaigns against Jews, which were implemented in phases including segregation, confinement and then extermination.

Displaced Palestinians sit in their makeshift shelter at a tent camp in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, December 12, 2023.

The US seems to be discontent with the scale of Israel's war on Gaza and how it is being conducted on the ground. But Washington has not been victorious in setting limits on operations so that they stick to Hamas and its allies.

This does not mean that the US is backing down on its support of Israel. Despite some setbacks in Congress and public reaction, US military aid continues to flow into Israel. Washington has also made the UN Security Council dysfunctional by obstructing every attempt to put a stop to the war.

Israel's future uncertain

Meanwhile, back in Israel, Netanyahu continues to face serious problems. According to opinion polls, most Israelis do not want the prime minister to continue in office and favour holding elections as soon as the war ends.

Surveys also find that the general public most wants Israel's hostages to be rescued, with military operations to achieve that receiving the most backing.

Netanyahu's actions on the ground hardly seem proportionate to achieve those ends. The scale of his action in Gaza implies he probably considers them impossible already. He will take it as a bonus within his much wider objectives if any of them can be achieved.

Netanyahu must feel that his future and legacy are at stake. He is continuing the war on such a scale because if he stops, he will likely fall.

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