The bodies of the above Israeli hostages were retrieved by IDF. They are : Top row, left to right: Yoram Metzger, Alexander Dancyg, Avraham Munder. Bottom row, left to right: Chaim Peri, Nadav Popplewell, and Yagev Buchshtab. Hostage and Missing Families Forum/Reuters
Retrieving dead hostages is the Israeli government’s choice: It avoids concessions and prevents the hostages from revealing details about their captivity or over the state’s abandonment ■ Netanyahu, firm on retaining control of key Gaza routes and resuming fighting, signaled to Hamas leader Sinwar: No deal
The six hostages whose bodies were retrieved from Khan Yunis on Tuesday, in a joint operation of the Israel Defense Forces and the Shin Bet security service, were alive at least until the end of the winter. The circumstances of their deaths are still unclear.
It appears that some of them died in an IDF airstrike, though it’s possible that some were murdered by their Hamas captors. The organization that kidnapped them alive while murdering many of their friends and family members in Nir Oz and Nirim is the main party to blame for their deaths. But Hamas is not the only one who bears responsibility.
Last December, Hamas retracted its agreement with Israel at the last minute, during the implementation of the first hostage deal, on its last day. Instead of returning more women, including some of the young ones who had been kidnapped at the Nova music festival, as it had committed to do, the organization wanted to alter the agreement and release a few elderly hostages (some of whose bodies were retrieved on Tuesday) as well as a few bodies. Israel’s leaders refused, worried that the opportunity for returning the younger women would be lost. The negotiations collapsed, and since then no hostages have been returned by agreement. That decision is fiercely controversial to this day in political and military echelons.
However, this wasn’t the only missed opportunity. Since the beginning of the current year, repeated efforts have been made by the mediators to reach a deal. The recalcitrance of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has played a part in failing to reach one, along with Hamas’ obstinacy. At least 14 hostages have died meanwhile in Hamas captivity, between the last deal and the present. It’s no surprise that the families of the retrieved dead hostages did not express any special gratitude to Netanyahu on Tuesday.
On the contrary, while they thanked the defense establishment, many had scathing criticism for the prime minister. They blamed him for abandoning their loved ones twice: once when they were kidnapped on October 7 and a second time when they were left to die in captivity, months after they were abducted.
It’s clear that the residents of the communities along the Gaza border have lost all patience with the tactics and excuses of coalition members, many of whom expressed their condolences from their vacations overseas. The combative line was also evident in the unequivocal announcement made by Kibbutz Nirim, whose members refused to serve as props in a memorial ceremony being planned to commemorate October 7, led by Transportation Minister Miri Regev, one of the leaders of the pack of sycophants of Netanyahu in the years leading up to the calamity.
A few hours after announcing their refusal to take part in the planned ceremony, kibbutz members learned that two of the six bodies retrieved from Gaza were from their kibbutz.
Dead cat diplomacy
There is no way of blurring the fact that retrieving the bodies of hostages in a military operation is the outcome preferred by the government. Such an outcome does not require making any concessions, and the dead hostages cannot recount what happened to them during their captivity and how the state abandoned them after the massacre.
Netanyahu has no problem with risking the lives of IDF soldiers, with the consent of senior defense officials, in order to bring bodies back for burial in Israel. In contrast, it appears that he is unwilling to risk, even in the most minimal fashion, his political standing, in a deal which would oblige him to release large numbers of Palestinian prisoners, accompanied by a hasty withdrawal from most of the areas now held by the army in the Gaza Strip.
In recent days, his associates have leaked contradictory messages to the media every few hours. There have been TV broadcasts opening with fanfare, describing a supposedly imminent deal, with correspondents being briefed about Netanyahu having found a way to retain his radical right-wing coalition partners despite his intention of making a deal. In contrast, details have been leaked describing impossible demands made by Hamas.
This story ended, it seems, with what was published after Netanyahu’s mid-day meeting with two right-wing forums consisting of bereaved families and the parents of some of the hostages. Netanyahu’s office has been encouraging these groups almost from the first day of the war, in an attempt to disrupt protests against his policy.
In his meeting with them, Netanyahu insisted that Israel would not concede control over the Philadelphi route along the Gaza-Egypt border or along the Netzarim corridor which bisects the Gaza Strip, adding that Israel would resume the battle in any case after the first phase of a deal, after 42 days. His words sounded like another deliberate thwarting of the efforts made by the mediators to reach a deal. Netanyahu was in fact sending a signal to Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’ leader, telling him not to waste his time. No deal would be taking place.
This happened after Hamas rejected the updated American proposal, arguing (not completely without some justification) that the U.S. had become more flexible in meeting Israel’s demands. It’s possible that Sinwar is not interested in making progress at this point when there is a chance that Iran and Hezbollah will implement their revenge attack against Israel, possibly triggering the regional war he had hoped for when he first planned the massive terror attack against Israel.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who has left Israel for a visit to Egypt, gave Netanyahu a seal of approval when he determined that Israel had accepted the new mediation proposal. The prime minister’s gain was twofold: Hamas is the one blowing up the negotiations and Netanyahu is exempt from making any concessions, since the deal has been scuttled.
A former senior official in the U.S. administration, with decades of experience in diplomatic negotiations in the Middle East, remembered this week how James Baker, the Secretary of State under the senior George Bush, used to term such talks “dead cat diplomacy.” Sometimes, said Baker, the aim of negotiations is not to reach a deal but to push the blame, the dead cat, toward the doorstep of your rival.
Both Netanyahu and Sinwar are playing this game now. It appears that Netanyahu is doing so with greater success. The Israeli public, the vast majority of which favors a deal according to all polls, is shedding a tear with the families of the hostages, but is not, for the most part, mobilizing for a campaign aimed at saving them.
Haaretz
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