According to the Palestinian Samaa news agency, Netanyahu on Saturday night reacted to the recent threats and conditions of Gantz, with the prime minister office issuing a statement asking him to respond to the three questions if he cares for Israel’s internal interests and is not looking for an excuse to overthrow the regime.
The three questions included: Is he ready to continue the Rafah operation to destroy the Hamas battalions, and if so, how does he threaten to collapse the war cabinet in the midst of this operation? Is he against the Palestinian Authority’s rule over Gaza even without Abbas? and, Is Gantz willing to accept a Palestinian state in Gaza and the West Bank under the framework of the normalization of relations with Saudi Arabia?
The statement claimed that Netanyahu’s stance is quite clear as “he is determined to destroy Hamas but is against the entry of the Palestinian Authority into Gaza, and that if a Palestinian state is formed, it will definitely be a terrorist state”.
The statement came hours after Gantz gave Netanyahu a June 10 deadline to present a specific war strategy and asked him to specify a framework for negotiations.
"The big war that Israel entered into revealed the great pains of the Israelis," he said during a news conference on Saturday and threatened that “he will leave the war cabinet if Netanyahu does not accept his demands.”
He said that “if Netanyahu continues his path, we will be forced to hold elections”. Gantz also called the recent proposal on the prisoners swap with the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas balanced and emphasized that it can be developed.
Meanwhile, leader of the opposition and the former prime minister, Yair Lapid also said on Saturday evening before Gantz's speech that he should announce his withdrawal from “the worst coalition cabinet”.
“Gantz must declare that he will not be a part of the betrayal of the prisoners, the displacement of settlers in the north and the destruction of the economy”, Lapid said in a statement.
“We must end Netanyahu's rule and get rid of him”, he said, predicting that “Netanyahu's cabinet will fall and a new Israeli government will be formed.”
Netanyahu and his cabinet are under intense pressure as they have failed, so far, to achieve any of their intended goals in the genocidal war on the Gaza Strip. Both Gantz and Lapid have long been expressing their discontent over Netanyahu’s policies.
But the Israeli prime minister is being backed by other members of the war cabinet such as Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Yoel Smotrich, two far-right ministers who often call Gantz and Lapid "deceivers".
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