Israeli officials separately told The Wall Street Journal on Sunday that Israel has not achieved its goal of destroying Hamas despite its bombing campaign and ground invasion.
Israeli military chief Yoav Gallant attempted to storm Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office in what almost led to a brawl between both officials, Israel’s Walla news website reported on Saturday.
The Hebrew report, widely cited by viral media including Al Jazeera, said Gallant would sometimes decline calls from Netanyahu’s office “for days”, showing an internal division between the officials as the genocidal war on Gaza continues.
Since October 7, Israel has killed 25,105 Palestinians in Gaza, 70% of whom are women and children, and has continued to carry out harrowing crimes on the ground against civilians.
The relentless Israeli bombardment and field executions have persisted amid the division within Israel’s war cabinet.
In Tel Aviv, Netanyahu’s office has been under immense public pressure to pause the war in Gaza to release more than 100 remaining captives while calling for his resignation.
Israel killed an unconfirmed number of captives in Gaza and only admitted “mistakenly” killing three on December 15.
Reports last week have also claimed that Gallant had stormed out of a war cabinet meeting due to an argument with Netanyahu over allowing chief of staff, Shachar Katz, to attend.
“Stop getting in the way of my work,” Gallant told Netanyahu, as quoted in Israeli media reports at the time.
The Times separately reported on Saturday that Israel’s war cabinet “is on its last legs,” as former Israeli military commander, Gadi Eisenkot, said Netanyahu has not been honest about the war goals in Gaza.
Israel waged the deadly genocidal war on Gaza on October 7, 2023, following Hamas’s surprise attack, which saw the group infiltrate the occupied territories through air, land and sea while returning to Gaza with at least 240 captives.
Tel Aviv has since vowed to reduce the besieged enclave to rubble and eliminate Hamas, a goal that analysts have widely described as unrealistic.
Despite supporting Israel’s right to self-defence, the United States has had its doubts over the war’s goals.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken had told Netanyahu that there is no military solution to Hamas in Gaza, NBC reported last week, citing anonymous officials.
Israeli officials separately told The Wall Street Journal on Sunday that Israel has not achieved its goal of destroying Hamas despite its bombing campaign and ground invasion. Israel has sustained record losses, including 531 soldiers.
More countries have taken a clear stance against Israel’s atrocities on the ground in Gaza. On January 24, the Swiss Federal Prosecutor’s Office placed Israeli President Isaac Herzog under criminal investigation in Switzerland over crimes against humanity in Gaza.
“The criminal complaints will now be examined in accordance with the usual procedure,” the prosecutor’s office said in a statement.
The move echoed a move by the Mexican and Chilean governments on Thursday when they filed a joint request to the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to investigate Israeli war crimes against Palestinians.
South Africa held Israel to account by taking up its crimes in Gaza to the International Court of Justice on December 29, 2023. South Africa presented its testimonies at the ICJ on January 11, where it outlined Israel’s “genocidal intent”.
Adila Hassim, one of South Africa’s representatives at The Hague, listed a series of violations of the Genocide Convention – to which Israel is a party – including the “mass killing of Palestinians in Gaza.”
“South Africa contends that Israel has transgressed Article 2 of the convention by committing actions that fall within the definition of genocide. The actions show systematic patterns of conduct from which genocide can be inferred,” she said.
