7/10/2024–|Last updated: 10/7/202404:51 PM (Mecca time)
On Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described the war that Israel has been waging in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon for a year as a “defense of Israel’s existence,” stressing that its goal is to “change the security situation” in the region to ensure that the attack of October 7, 2023 is not repeated.
Israeli Channel 12 also said that Netanyahu proposed changing the name of the war on the Gaza Strip from “Iron Swords” to “The Renaissance War.”
This comes as Israeli media reported that Netanyahu invited a number of his ministers to urgent security consultations in his office, and these do not include Defense Minister Yoav Galant.
She pointed out that Gallant’s failure to invite him to the security meeting reflects the severity of the dispute between him and Netanyahu, and that the latter is still thinking about replacing him.
She said that the consultations are being held in the midst of Tel Aviv’s efforts to respond to the recent Iranian attack, and include a discussion of the Gaza and Lebanon war, while they will not address the issue of returning Israeli detainees from the Gaza Strip.
In his speech – on the occasion of the one-year anniversary of the attacks of October 7, 2023 – Netanyahu said that he wants to change the name of the war from “Iron Swords” to “The Renaissance War.”
He added that he was committed to returning the prisoners detained in Gaza, stressing that the war would not end except by undermining the rule of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) and returning all detainees to their homes.
He added that Israel’s attack on what he called the “Iranian axis of evil” is necessary to ensure its security in the future, stressing that the security reality in the region will change.
Government of guilt
Commenting on Netanyahu’s proposal to change the name of the war, Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid said, “There will be no new renaissance without the return of the kidnapped and displaced people to their homes.”
He added, “Netanyahu and members of his government coalition can change the labels as they wish, but they cannot change the fact that the greatest disaster that has befallen the people of Israel since its establishment occurred during their reign.”
Lapid described Netanyahu’s government as a “government of guilt” and not a “government of renaissance,” he said.
It is noteworthy that today marks the first anniversary of the start of Israel’s war on the Gaza Strip, which resulted in more than 139,000 Palestinian martyrs and wounded, most of them children and women, and more than 10,000 missing persons, amid massive destruction and famine that killed dozens of children and the elderly.
Although a year has passed since the start of the war, Israel has been unable to achieve any of its declared goals, especially recovering prisoners from the Gaza Strip and eliminating the capabilities of Hamas and the rest of the resistance factions.