Orit Strook: We stayed in the government to save Israel from the brink

National Missions Minister Orit Strook revealed yesterday (Wednesday) that the intelligence information received by the government supports the stance of the Religious Zionism party that the hostage deal is a bad one.

At a Zehut conference taking place after the cabinet meeting yesterday regarding how to move forward following Hamas' threat to suspend hostage releases and President Trump's ultimatum in response, Minister Strook revealed that the intelligence information she receives as a cabinet member justifies her position and Minister Smotrich's position regarding the severe dangers of the hostage deal.

Strook noted that all cabinet members who are exposed to this information now understand the dangers that the Religious Zionism ministers had discussed. She added: "We remained in the government to rescue the entire country from collapse."

Strook thus echoes the views of Religious Zionism party leader Bezalel Smotrich, who explained that he decided to stay in the government rather than leave it over the approval of the hostage deal, as Itamar Ben Gvir and his Otzmah Yehudit party.

Smotrich said that if he left the government, the coalition would become a minority government, dependent on the votes of the opposition to move forward with the hostage deal, which would mean a certain end to the war. Moreover, if Netanyahu refused to accept this "safety net," then Israel would go to elections and likely elect a center-left government which would also end the war.

Indeed, Smotrich spent the days leading up to the approval of the hostage deal trying to extract guarantees from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the government would restart the war following the first phase of the hostage deal.

He later said in an interview that one of the reasons he strongly opposed the deal was that his constituents, many of whom live in Judea and Samaria, would be the first to pay the price for any major release of Palestinian terrorists in the hostage deal.