Yashar party leader and former IDF chief of staff Gadi Eisenkot pledged to destroy Hamas’s military wing and dismantle its leadership within 18 months of becoming prime minister while giving a briefing at the Gaza border on Thursday ahead of the October 27 elections.
“I pledge that within 18 months of taking office as prime minister, Hamas will no longer rule the Gaza Strip. We will destroy Hamas’ military wing,” he said during a press statement near the communities bordering the Gaza Strip in the South.
“This will happen either through action based on President Trump’s framework, which Netanyahu’s government accepted, or through the use of military and operational capabilities,” he added.
Eisenkot said the plan to eliminate Hamas would be formulated with the heads of the defense establishment, “restore the National Security Council,” and would be presented at the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee.
Yashar has been leading in recent polls and is part of the opposition bloc seeking to replace Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Eisenkot confident in his ability to dismantle Hamas
Eisenkot said he was confident in his ability to dismantle Hamas, based on his past military experience in the IDF, Mossad and security establishments.
Eisenkot rose through the IDF’s Golani infantry brigade and was OC Northern Command before serving as chief of staff from 2015 - 2019. His military career put him at the center of Israel’s confrontation with Iranian forces and their allies in Syria,
Eisenkot also warned on Thursday that, according to intelligence reports and senior security officials, Hamas was “restoring its military capabilities, reestablishing itself in the Gaza Strip, and attempting to carry out terrorist acts against us.”
He sharply criticized Netanyahu for lacking strategic military objectives.
“Let it be clear: as long as Benjamin Netanyahu is in power, Hamas will remain in power,” Eisenkot said.
“There is a way to prevent the next disaster, if we make courageous decisions and formulate a national strategy.”
Eisenkot reaffirmed his commitment to establishing a State Commission of Inquiry to investigate government failures on October 7 within 150 days of the establishment of the new government.
Over three years since the massacre, no probe has been conducted, as the political echelon has repeatedly blocked a State Commission of Inquiry from being established. Netanyahu has repeatedly spoken out against judicial appointments being part of the investigation.
Eisenkot also vowed that the next government led by him would pass a conscription law to draft haredim (ultra-Orthodox) to the IDF.
Likud, Eisenkot clash over Arab parties preventing future Gaza operations
In response, Netanyahu’s ruling Likud party stated: “How would you destroy Hamas without getting permission from your partners, Mansour [Abbas] and [Ahmed] Tibi?”
Likud’s statement insinuated that a government including Arab parties would prevent an operation in Gaza, though Abbas’s Ra’am was a coalition partner during several strikes against Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, including an IDF operation targeting Hamas tunnels just days after the coalition’s formation in June 2021 and during the 2022 Operation Breaking Dawn.
“For 17 years, Netanyahu and Likud have misled Israel’s citizens and strengthened Hamas,” Eisenkot said in response to Likud.
“If you had focused a little more on doing your job and a little less on drafting talking points, perhaps October 7 could have been prevented. In 12 days, you’re going home.”
Notably, Eisenkot has repeatedly insisted he would not allow Abbas or Tibi’s Joint List to join his coalition, telling The Jerusalem Post that he did not consider them viable partners.
“In the basic guidelines of the next government, it will be written that whoever does not accept that Hamas is a terrorist organization, that it needs to be dismantled and destroyed, will not be a partner in the next government,” he said.
“And therefore I do not see an Arab party that accepts my principles.”
Other parties aligned with Netanayhu’s bloc ahead of the elections also sharply criticized Eisenkot’s statements.
People of Israel's Ofer Winter: Eisenkot, Golan cannot lead Israel to decisive victory
People of Israel leader Ofer Winter referred to Eisenkot as the chief of staff who “embodied the ‘conzeptzia (military mentality of containment),’ pushed for containment and negotiated arrangements, and called for the war to stop before we entered Rafah,” insisting that he could not lead Israel to victory.
“Eisenkot appointed Yair Golan, Aharon Haliva, and Herzi Halevi, and promoted disastrous doctrines that led Israel to October 7. There will not be, and cannot be, a decisive victory under a government led by Gadi Eisenkot and Yair Golan,” he said.
National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who leads the Otzma Yehudit party, added that “There is no limit to the lies of the Arab and left-wing camp led by Eisenkot.”
“When Eisenkot was in the cabinet, he demanded a complete halt to the war, capitulation to all of Hamas’s demands, a full withdrawal from Gaza, and the release of all terrorists from Israeli prisons. He vehemently opposed taking Rafah and entering the Philadelphi Corridor and, of course, opposed taking the security zone in Lebanon,” he stated.