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Ultra-right minister
The hostage deal brings relief in Israel and around the world. Except for the right-wing minister Itamar Ben-Gvir
Itamar Ben-Gvir, Minister of National Security in Israel
© DPA
Itamar Ben-Gvir, Minister of National Security, considers the major fight against Hamas to be more important than saving the lives of individual hostages. It’s not the first time the southpaw has caused outrage.
On the night the Israeli government decides on the hostage deal, a woman stands in Israel who has achieved notoriety in front of the Ministry of Defense: Hadas Kalderon. “Act as if they were your children!” she shouts through a megaphone up to the government building. Kalderon’s entire family was kidnapped by Hamas from Kibbutz Nir Oz, including the children’s 16-year-old daughter, 12-year-old son and father. In Israel almost everyone knows her name and her story.
The politicians negotiated for six hours before making the decision: 35 of them voted for a temporary ceasefire in Gaza and a prisoner exchange to bring the hostages back home.
However, three voted against it. They belong to the right-wing extremist party “Otzma Yehudit” led by Itamar Ben-Gvir, the Minister for National security.
Ministers from the right-wing extremist party “Religious Zionism” also initially wanted to vote against the agreement. What changed her mind: the attempt Hamas to destroy is expected to continue after the four-day ceasefire.
Demonstrators like Hadas Kalderon are stunned by the ministers’ dissenting votes. And ask the question: Would the ministers have decided differently if the hostages came from the conservative religious spectrum? The abductees from the kibbutzim are largely from left-wing circles, those who have repeatedly sought exchanges with their Arab neighbors.
Ben-Gvir rails against the hostage deal
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, from the Religious Zionism party, is one of those who initially wanted to vote against the deal. Now he has written on the short message service X: “It’s no secret that we thought differently before the cabinet discussion.” Now he is of the opinion that “repatriating the hostages would advance the goals of the war.” Politicians are behind the army and are convinced that the soldiers are “the Hamas Nazis Gaza “will destroy and restore the security and national dignity of the citizens of Israel.”
Ben-Gvir, on the other hand, continues to criticize the hostage deal: On X, he describes it as a “dangerous precedent” that repeats past mistakes. He is referring to the Gilad Shalit agreement of 2011, in which more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners were released in return for one IDF soldier.
Ben-Gvir writes: “Hamas wanted this ceasefire more than anything else. It also wanted the women and Children “Get rid of them in the first phase because they are building up international pressure.” The fact that not all women and children are released together is also immoral. At the same time, Hamas was able to achieve too many of its demands, including the purchase of fuel, the release of prisoners and the interruption of attacks by the Israeli armed forces.
Itamar Ben-Gvir had already signaled in recent weeks that freeing the hostages would be lower on his agenda than taking action against terrorists. He only caused a lot of criticism on Monday when he antagonized families of hostages.
Politicians invited family members of abductees to the meeting. Actually, the idea is to answer their questions and listen to their stories. Just in these days, Ben-Gvir proposed a new law, namely the death penalty for terrorists. More precisely: According to the draft, “whoever intentionally or out of indifference causes the death of an Israeli citizen, if the act is carried out with a racist motivation or out of hostility against a certain population group” should be punished with death with the aim of “the State of Israel harm or the rebirth of the Jewish people in their homeland”. In the occupied West Bank, military courts should be able to pronounce death sentences with a simple majority.
The anger of the relatives: “Itamar Ben-Gvir – you have no limits”
The relatives of the hostages reacted with shock: The fact that Parliament was discussing this now of all times “endangers the lives of our loved ones beyond the existing risk, and without fulfilling any public purpose,” the families said in a statement.
On Monday evening, the families’ anger reached its climax when Itamar Ben-Gvir, of all people, approached a young relative and hugged him and had himself photographed. Although he clearly said that he didn’t want that. After the meeting, Gil Dickmann wrote on . Itamar Ben-Gvir – you have no limits. Everyone sees that you are organizing a circus over the blood of our families.”
Ben-Gvir’s party has repeatedly attracted attention with radical demands in the past. Party colleague Amichai Elijahu, the minister for cultural heritage, was asked in a radio interview at the beginning of November whether a nuclear bomb should be dropped on the Gaza Strip. “Yes, that would be a possibility,” he said. “We should look at what scares and deters them. Because threatening to kill them is not enough. They are not afraid of death.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu initially excluded Elijahu from cabinet meetings. “What Minister Elijahu said was wrong, unrealistic and does not reflect our policies. I reprimanded and punished him. If he does it again, he will no longer be part of the government.”