Israeli politicians have continued to send mixed signals on the prospects of a potential exchange deal with Hamas. Netanyahu said on Tuesday that he would not allow a deal that exchanged Palestinians held in Israeli prisons or lead to a ceasefire in Gaza.
“Itamar Ben-Gvir, the country’s national security minister and a known ultra-nationalists, had posted on X [before Netanyahu’s comments] that if Israel entered a deal that was “bad”, it would mean the dissolution of the coalition, essentially threatening to tear the government apart over a deal that he’s not in favour of,” Al Jazeera correspondent Hamdah Salhut reported from occupied East Jerusalem.
“But shortly after that you had the opposition leader, Yair Lapid, a fierce critic of the prime minister, saying he would support the government in any deal that brings back the captives from Gaza. So there’s a lot of pressure on Netanyahu, and a lot of disagreement within his own coalition, within the war cabinet, and even the opposition.”
