Classified documents and high-level interrogations have exposed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's controversial decade-long approach to Hamas. These revelations shed new light on the decisions that may have inadvertently paved the way for the current conflict.
These are Netanyahu's four choices that may have accidentally strengthened the militant group and caused the current war, the deaths of 1200 Israeli civilians, the kidnap of many hostages and the subsequent murder of others, the deaths of 700 IDF soldiers, the maiming and life-long PTSD of other soldiers, the bereaved families and a devastated nation. In fact, these choices are what may even bring about his downfall.
Here they are:
1. Netanyahu approved the prisoner trade involving Gilad Shalit. Yahya Sinwar, the current head of Hamas, was among the roughly 1,000 Palestinian prisoners released as a result of this agreement. There were numerous warnings not to release Sinwar, yet Netanyahu went ahead and did it anyway.
2. Netanyahu approved the continuous inflow of Gulf funds into Gaza (Hundreds of millions of dollars in cash from Saudi Arabia and Qatar, delivered in suitcases every month.) Although Ismail Haniyeh pledged to spend the money for infrastructure in the civilian sector, Netanyahu unfortunately chose to take him at his word. It's highly likely that the 'infrastructure' money was actually used to support Hamas' military branch, to build terror tunnels.
3. Netanyahu persistently refusing to remove Hamas's leadership. During the last decade, the Shin Bet and Mossad presented several strategies to bring down not only key figures such as Muhammad Deif and Sinwar but also the entire top level of Hamas leadership (they even presented an almost fool-proof plan which would leave no Israeli fingerprints). But Netanyahu always chose moderation.
4. Perhaps the worst of all these errors (and let's face it – they are all major) is the strategy that Netanyahu himself acknowledged, and that is arming Hamas in order to weaken the Palestinian Authority.
Netanyahu believed that his actions had lulled Hamas into a sense of complacency, that if they had money, they would give up their plans to destroy Israel and that they were actually going to come to a long-lasting agrreement with Israel, and that they might even establish diplomatic ties in the future to allow the reconstruction of Gaza and the West Bank.
We now know that although this plan was a well-thought-out attempt to thwart a united Palestinian front, it backfired spectacularly.
These revelations come at a crucial juncture in the conflict, as Israel debates its next moves in Gaza. The ongoing hostage negotiations have reached a critical impasse over control of the Philadelphi Corridor, a strategic 14-kilometer strip along the Egypt-Gaza border. Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar reportedly sees this corridor as his potential escape route, possibly planning to smuggle himself and remaining hostages to Iran via Sinai.
Netanyahu, haunted by his past decisions, now stands firm against relinquishing control of the corridor, even at the cost of stalled hostage releases. This stance has created widespread fury as Israelis take to the street rallying for an immediate hostage deal (no matter the cost), tension with both international mediators and within his own cabinet.
What we now know is that unfortunately and at a huge national cost, Hamas wasn't lulled into anything– rather it was Netanyahu and Israel that were lulled into a false sense of complacency as Hamas bided their time, ultimately carrying out their October 7 attack on Israel.
* The Jewish Chronicle contributed to this article.