TEL AVIV — As more than 100,000 Israelis flooded the streets of this city on Saturday night demanding that Israel accept a U.S.-brokered deal to return Hamas-held hostages and eventually finish the war in Gaza, members of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right coalition threatened to collapse the government if the proposal were to be implemented.
The dueling bids were directed at Netanyahu, whose office said Friday that it “authorized” the text of the three-phased deal that President Biden announced on Friday. But on Saturday, it added that “Israel’s conditions for ending the war have not changed,” and that any deal that does not condition a permanent cease-fire on the destruction of Hamas military and governing capabilities was a “non-starter.”
The proposal includes the halt of fighting for six weeks to swap the hostages in Hamas captivity for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and a significant boost in aid shipments into the enclave. At least 36,439 people have been killed and 82,627 injured in Gaza since the war began, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants but says the majority of the dead are women and children. Israel estimates that about 1,200 people were killed in Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack, mostly civilians, and 253 were taken hostages. It says 293 soldiers have been killed since the launch of its military operation in Gaza.
Hamas said Friday that it viewed Biden’s speech on the deal “positively,” and that it “affirms its position of readiness to deal positively and constructively with any proposal based on a permanent ceasefire, complete withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, reconstruction, the return of the displaced to all their places of residence, and the completion of a serious prisoner exchange deal.”
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Biden’s televised speech came after sundown on Friday, as some far-right members of Netanyahu’s coalition were observing the Jewish Sabbath, during which they abstain from work or using their phones.
When the Sabbath ended on Saturday night, the far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben Gvir, tweeted that the deal “is not absolute victory, but rather absolute defeat.” If Netanyahu goes ahead with it, he said, his party would “dismantle the government.”
Bezalel Smotrich, another ultranationalist member of Netanyahu’s coalition, tweeted that he told Netanyahu he would also quit the government if the deal went through.
“We demand the continuation of the fighting until the destruction of Hamas and the return of all the hostages, the creation of a completely different security reality in Gaza and Lebanon, the return of all residents to their homes in the north and south and a massive investment in the accelerated development of these areas of the country,” he said.
For weeks, Netanyahu has been under competing pressures: from moderate members of his war cabinet, who have been pushing for a deal, and the less influential, more hard-line partners in his coalition and his base, who have continuously insisted on “absolute victory” in Gaza.
Opposition leader Yair Lapid said that the government would not necessarily collapse without Ben Gvir and Smotrich, and that he would be willing to provide a “safety net” that would enable it to see through the cease-fire deal and hostage releases.
“The threats from Ben Gvir and Smotrich are [an act of] abandoning national security, the hostages and residents of the north and the south,” Lapid tweeted Saturday night. “This is the worst, most reckless government in the history of the country. From their perspective, let there be war here forever.”
The tweet exchanges coincided with several demonstrations across Tel Aviv on Saturday night, in which more than 120,000 people took to the streets, according to organizers. They chanted calls for the government to implement the deal, saying they viewed Biden’s announcement as a turning point after eight months of agonizing limbo.
“We will continue to fight until the destruction government says yes to Netanyahu’s deal,” said Ayala Metzger, whose father-in-law, Yoram Metzger, 80, is being held in Gaza. She spoke near the Israeli military headquarters in Tel Aviv, where police clashed with thousands of protesters chanting for the immediate overthrow of the government. Her leg was injured by police cavalry, according to videos that circulated on social media.
“Our trust, as citizens, in the government collapsed on Oct. 7, and nothing has been done to repair it,” said Gil Dickman, whose cousin Carmel Gat is a hostage.
“Biden is showing himself as the responsible adult in the room, saying, ‘I will tell you the situation, so that no one can retreat afterward because of some political reason or another,’” Dickman said. Addressing Netanyahu, he added: “Biden is saying that this train has already left the station. Now the question is, will you get on it and get the hostages home or stay with your head to the wall, as if you want to continue the war forever.”
Hostage families have intensified efforts to pressure the government into reviving negotiations, attempting to convince officials that the Israeli public would support a deal that would return all the hostages.
“Family representatives called on all government ministers and coalition members to publicly commit to supporting the deal, to do everything possible to ensure it is implemented immediately, and to block any attempt to torpedo it,” said a statement Saturday by the Hostage Families Forum, an umbrella organization representing most of the relatives of those held inside Gaza.
“It’s now or never,” Dickman said.
He said that on Thursday, National Security Council chief Tzachi Hanegbi told him and several other hostage relatives that if the current cease-fire proposal is not implemented, “there is no plan B.”
Israeli President Isaac Herzog, whose position is mostly ceremonial, said on Sunday that he had thanked Biden for his speech and that he pledged to Netanyahu his full support a hostage deal.
“We must not forget that according to Jewish tradition, there is no greater commandment than redeeming captives and hostages, especially when it comes to Israeli citizens who the State of Israel was not able to defend,” he said during an address to the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
A statement by the United States, Egypt and Qatar — three countries that have attempted for months to broker an agreement between Israel and Hamas — said on Saturday: “These principles brought the demands of all parties together in a deal that serves multiple interests and will bring immediate relief both to the long-suffering people of Gaza as well as the long-suffering hostages and their families.”
“This deal offers a roadmap for a permanent ceasefire and ending the crisis,” it said.
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Officials from the United States, Israel and Egypt are meeting in Cairo on Sunday to discuss the reopening of the Rafah border crossing to let much needed aid into Gaza, a former Egyptian official familiar with the negotiations told The Washington Post. The proposal on the table would be temporary to handle the aid crisis, the official added, saying it would come into effect during a six-week time frame “set by Joe Biden to stop fighting.”
All 36 shelters in Rafah belonging to the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) are “empty now,” said Philippe Lazzarini, the agency’s commissioner-general. The recent escalation in Israeli operations in the area had triggered an exodus of more than 1 million from Rafah — most of whom had already been displaced several times, Lazzarini said on Saturday night. “All eyes are on the proposal to reach an end to this war through a ceasefire, the release of all hostages + substantial & safe flow of urgently needed supplies into Gaza,” he wrote. The Israel Defense Forces said Sunday it was continuing operations in the area, killing militants and locating weapons.
The IDF said Israeli Air Force jets struck a military compound used by Hezbollah operatives in Lebanon’s Beqaa valley in response to a Hezbollah surface-to-air missile that was fired Saturday at an IDF drone operating in Lebanese airspace. Hezbollah had claimed the attack on the unmanned vehicle on Saturday.
Yemen’s Houthi militant group said Saturday night that it had targeted the U.S. aircraft carrier Eisenhower — the second such attack on the vessel this week. The group said it carried out five other operations, including the targeting of an American destroyer in the Red Sea. The Houthis said the attacks were in response to IDF “crimes against the displaced in Rafah” and the expansion of military operations in this stage of war, as well as in response to American-British strikes on Yemen earlier in the week.
Dadouch reported from Beirut. Heba Farouk Mahfouz contributed to this report.