By Alexander Cornwell and May Angel
TEL AVIV/JERUSALEM (Reuters) -Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s support for Donald Trump’s Gaza plan is a gamble that may win back estranged allies abroad and repair his political base at home but risks a battle with coalition partners opposed to any hint of a Palestinian state.
Netanyahu, aligning himself with Trump, framed the plan as a joint effort that advances his government’s goals while shifting international criticism about the war onto Hamas, which must now choose between accepting it or facing continued siege.
The move could shore up Netanyahu’s support at home by ending an increasingly unpopular war and winning the release of hostages still held by the Palestinian militant group, bolstering his chances at elections due in a year’s time.
But the plan’s reference to a Palestinian state is likely to antagonise members of Netanyahu’s governing coalition, the most right-wing in Israel’s history, where ultra-nationalist allies Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich hold outsized influence.
PLAN PUTS ALL PRESSURE ON HAMAS, ASKS LITTLE OF ISRAEL
Nadav Shtrauchler, a former adviser to Netanyahu, called the deal a “win-win” for the prime minister, saying that it shifts all the pressure onto Hamas while easing international scrutiny of Israel, and leaves coalition critics with no alternative.
“For him, it’s checkmate. It’s a very strong move,” he said, that could see Netanyahu enter the next election with the hostages released and Israel’s push to expand ties with Arab and Muslim nations, a process derailed by the war in Gaza, revived.
Trump’s proposal, quickly endorsed by leaders across the Arab and Muslim world, asks little of Israel in the short term.
Instead, it puts all the pressure on Hamas, demanding the freedom for all of the remaining hostages and the surrender of its weapons as a precondition for ending Israel’s siege of Gaza.
Israel’s military would remain in Gaza for now, pulling back to positions along the border only once an international force assumes control. Netanyahu, who has insisted that Israel must retain overall security control after the war, said on Tuesday the military would stay in most of Gaza but offered no timeline.
COALITION PARTNER SLAMS PLAN AS ‘POLITICAL ILLUSIONS’
In a lengthy post on X on Tuesday, Smotrich, who has openly called for Israel’s Gaza campaign to continue, denounced Trump’s plan, arguing it would trade “real achievements on the ground for political illusions”. His Religious Zionism party holds seven of the Knesset’s 120 seats, though recent polls indicate that he would struggle to win any if elections were held today.
Israel’s war in Gaza, launched in response to Hamas’ October 2023 surprise attack, has lost support among much of the public. A survey published on Tuesday by the Jerusalem-based Israel Democracy Institute found that 66% of Israelis believe that it is time to end the war, including 48.5% on the political right.
Eran Lerman, a former deputy national security adviser, said that Netanyahu knows Hamas’ acceptance of Trump’s plan could shatter his ruling coalition, but may still hope to be able to face voters with “a very different perspective on what happened over the last two years” than he would able to present today.
“I’m not sure that this is true, but you know, politicians are easily tempted to believe in things that cohere with their ambitions,” said Lerman, who is also vice president of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security think tank.
Israel’s opposition, made up of right, center and left parties, has also called for an end to the war and is often critical of Smotrich and Ben-Gvir, another far-right minister with outsized coalition influence. Many have also ruled out joining a future coalition with Netanyahu’s ultra-Orthodox allies over their communities’ refusal to serve in the military.
A source briefed on the matter said that Netanyahu would not bring Trump’s 20-point plan to government for approval and would instead ask ministers only to vote on the terms to free the hostages. Israel is to free hundreds of Palestinian detainees in exchange.
Former Israeli diplomat Alon Pinkas cautioned that Netanyahu would likely draw out negotiations on issues that remain ambiguous, such as the withdrawal of Israel’s military, with the aim of both surviving politically and undermining Trump’s plan.
FOR NETANYAHU, ARAB ALLIANCES MAY OUTFLANK RIGHT-WING FURY
Israel has faced mounting international isolation over the nearly two-year-old war in Gaza. This month, some of its closest allies have formally recognized a Palestinian state despite Israeli objections, while others have sanctioned senior government ministers and imposed bans on weapons transfers to Israel.
Hamas, for its part, has little diplomatic leverage. It can accept the terms or try to negotiate, but that would risk the plan being enforced in areas it no longer controls while Trump gives Israel a green light to continue attacking the group.
A source briefed on the matter said that Netanyahu had pushed to remove a reference in Trump’s plan to Palestinian statehood, which the Israeli leader has said would never happen.
The document does not offer a clear path to statehood. Instead, it says that as Gaza is rebuilt and once the Palestinian Authority’s reform program is “faithfully carried out”, conditions “may finally be in place for a credible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood, which we recognize as the aspiration of the Palestinian people.”
That language is likely to anger many of Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition allies, who had publicly warned ahead of his meeting with Trump against any mention of a Palestinian state.
But standing beside Trump, Netanyahu said the document laid the groundwork for dramatically advancing peace in the region and beyond, signaling both leaders’ ambitions to expand Israel’s ties with Muslim states that still do not recognize it.
Neve Gordon, an Israeli scholar at Queen Mary University of London, said that Netanyahu likely believes he can win the next election, scheduled to be held by October 2026, if he has a plan in place to normalise ties with more Arab and Muslim states.
But he cautioned that even after accepting Trump’s plan, Netanyahu could later break from it and place the blame on Hamas, a tactic the Israeli scholar noted he has used before, and which could even strengthen his standing politically.
(Reporting by Alexander Cornwell in Tel Aviv and May Angel in Jerusalem, additional reporting by Steven Scheer in Jerusalem, Editing by William Maclean)
Comments