Gallant: Hamas as ‘military formation’ in Gaza is gone, IDF focus shifting to north

Hamas is no longer an organized military force in the Gaza Strip after Israel’s 11-month ongoing military campaign, sparked by the terror group’s October 7 massacre, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told foreign journalists on Monday. Later Tuesday, meanwhile, Gallant told troops that the IDF was shifting its focus from Gaza to the northern front, and that they should prepare for a ground offensive there.

“Hamas as a military formation no longer exists. Hamas is engaged in guerrilla warfare and we are still fighting Hamas terrorists and pursuing Hamas leadership,” Gallant told the foreign press, while warning that the window was closing on an opportunity to reach a temporary hostage-ceasefire deal with the Palestinian terror group, which he said could also bring calm to the volatile northern border with Lebanon.

Gallant said that conditions are ripe for at least the first phase of the proposal currently being discussed — a six-week pause in which some 30 women, children, elderly and ailing hostages would be released. However, he would not commit to a permanent end to the fighting, as Hamas has demanded, raising questions about the feasibility of a deal.

“Israel should achieve an agreement that will bring about a pause for six weeks and bring back hostages,” he said. After that period, he said, “we maintain the right to operate and achieve our goals — including the destruction of Hamas.”

The United States, along with mediators Egypt and Qatar, has been working for months to broker a hostage release and ceasefire to end the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas. A main area of disagreement has been the terror group’s demand for an end to the war and a full withdrawal of all Israel Defense Forces troops from Gaza.

In recent weeks, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has raised a new sticking point, saying that Israel must remain stationed in the strategic Philadelphi Corridor along Gaza’s border with Egypt indefinitely.

But Gallant has been quoted by Hebrew media as saying that Israel could withdraw from the corridor for six weeks — for the sake of having hostages released from Gaza — without risking Israel’s security. The two men reportedly got into a heated shouting match at a recent cabinet meeting where ministers overwhelmingly sided with Netanyahu.

During Monday’s meeting with foreign journalists, Gallant was asked about his relationship with the prime minister.

“As defense minister, my first priority is the State of Israel and those who protect it, and then everything else,” he said.

The current US-led proposal calls for a three-phase plan, beginning with the six-week pause in fighting during which Hamas would release some of 97 hostages — not all of them alive — who have been held in Gaza since the terror group’s October 7 massacre.

In exchange, Israel would free dozens of Palestinian security prisoners, withdraw troops from Palestinian population centers, allow displaced Gazans to return to their original places of residence and facilitate the influx of large amounts of humanitarian aid.

Hamas released 105 civilians of 251 hostages seized on October 7 during a weeklong truce in late November, and four abductees were released before that. Eight hostages have been rescued by troops alive, and the bodies of 37 hostages have also been recovered, including three mistakenly killed by the Israeli military as they tried to escape their captors.

Hamas is also holding two Israeli civilians who entered the Strip in 2014 and 2015, as well as the bodies of two IDF soldiers who were killed in 2014.

White House national security spokesman John Kirby said on Monday that Hamas had sought changes to the evolving proposal, calling it the “main obstacle” to a deal. Hamas rejected Kirby’s allegations as “baseless” and again accused the US of hindering an agreement by siding with Israel.

Gallant cast doubt on Hamas’s intentions and was skeptical about whether the deal’s second phase — which is to include the release of the remaining hostages and a complete halt to the fighting — could be implemented.

He said repeatedly that Israel remains committed to its “war goals” — bringing home all hostages, destroying Hamas’s military and governing capabilities, and making sure the group can never threaten Israel again.

With Hamas repeatedly regrouping in areas of Gaza that IDF troops have left, and with no plan for an alternative postwar government, it remains unclear when or if these goals can be fully achieved.

Gallant accused Hamas of intransigence in the talks and called for more international pressure on the Iran-backed terror group. Still, he said that after inflicting heavy damage recently on Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon, there is an opportunity for at least the first phase of the deal.
Shifting focus to Lebanon

He said he believed a truce with Hamas could also lower tensions with Hezbollah and allow Israelis who have been displaced since October 8 to return to their homes in northern Israel, near the Lebanese border.

“Achieving an agreement is also a strategic opportunity that gives us a high chance to change the security situation on all fronts,” Gallant said.

However, speaking later to troops during a drill in northern Israel simulating a ground offensive in Lebanon, Gallant said Israel was moving its focus to the northern front and they should prepare for a Gaza-style ground operation there.

“The center of gravity is moving to the north, we are nearing the completion of our missions in the south, but we have a task here that has not been carried out, and this mission is to change the security situation and return the residents to their homes,” he said to reservists of the Oded Brigade in northern Israel.

“These instructions you are waiting for, I gave in the south and saw the forces at work,” Gallant said, referring to Israel’s ground offensive in Gaza. He added that such orders “will come here as well and you should be prepared and ready to carry out this mission.”

“We are finishing training the entire order of battle for a ground operation [in Lebanon], in all its aspects,” Gallant said. “I’ve already seen in many circumstances where I stood next to troops who told me: ‘You are just talking.’ After a week I met them on the ground.”

Hezbollah began striking Israel immediately after Hamas’s October 7 massacre ignited the war. Israel and Hezbollah have exchanged cross-border fire daily, coming close on several occasions to a full-blown war.

The fighting has forced tens of thousands of Israelis and Lebanese to flee their homes near the volatile border and resulted in 26 civilian deaths on the Israeli side, as well as the deaths of 20 IDF soldiers and reservists. There have also been several attacks from Syria, without any injuries.

Hezbollah has named 434 members who have been killed by Israel during the ongoing skirmishes, mostly in Lebanon but some also in Syria. Another 78 operatives from other terror groups, a Lebanese soldier, and dozens of civilians have also been killed.

It seems unlikely that Hamas would accept a partial deal in which it would give up the hostages — its most valuable bargaining chips — for only a brief pause in the Israeli military campaign.

But international mediators have been working on a bridging proposal that they hope could meet the demands of all sides. US President Joe Biden said last week he was “optimistic” that a deal was within reach.

At home, the Israeli government faces significant domestic pressure to reach a deal as well, particularly after the deaths of six hostages who were executed by their Hamas captors earlier this month as troops approached the area where they were being held.

Gallant described the current situation as a “strategic junction” — where Israel can reach a deal with its adversaries or risk fighting a broader war that could draw in Hezbollah and its sponsor Iran.

Gallant said he prefers a deal, but that Israel is ready for all scenarios. “We are capable of defending ourselves and we can also retaliate if necessary,” he said. “We have the ability to hit any strategic goal in Iran.”

Israel’s offensive in Gaza has forced hundreds of thousands of people into tent camps and schools-turned-shelters, gutted the health system, and contributed to widespread hunger. Israel has been working with international aid workers in recent weeks on a mass vaccination program to prevent a polio outbreak in the territory from spreading.

As for the humanitarian situation, Gallant said he has assembled an advisory group of experts to focus on five areas of need: improved medical care, aid deliveries, energy, water and sanitation, and better communications with aid workers.

“We discuss and hold situation assessments on this issue twice a week,” he said.

The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry says more than 40,000 people in the Strip have been killed or are presumed dead in the fighting so far, though the toll cannot be verified and does not differentiate between civilians and fighters. Israel says it has killed some 17,000 combatants in battle and another 1,000 terrorists inside Israel on October 7.

Israel has said it seeks to minimize civilian fatalities and stresses that Hamas uses Gaza’s civilians as human shields, fighting from civilian areas including homes, hospitals, schools, and mosques.

Source » timesofisrael.com