Attitude Toward Hamas Must Change

Over the last two days, Israel has been a nation in mourning after receiving news of six hostages being executed by Hamas shortly before they were found by the Israel Defence Forces. That blow was quickly followed by news of three border police officers being killed in a terrorist attack near Hebron.

Such was the grief and outrage that much of Israel shut down on Monday as hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets, protesting over the cold-blooded murder of these six hostages. There were huge rallies calling for Israel to reach a hostage release deal with Hamas.

Many of the protestors blame Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for refusing to approve the current proposal for a ceasefire and hostage release. But Netanyahu says any deal must have acceptable terms, and Israel must be allowed to finish the conflict with Hamas, to avoid suffering another massacre like that of October 7th:

"The fact that Hamas is continuing to perpetrate atrocities like those it carried out on October 7th
requires us to do everything so that it will be unable to perpetrate these atrocities again."

Amid the numerous opinions expressed about the situation, Israel’s president, Isaac Herzog, expressed one that goes to the heart of the matter, when he said:

"I believe the whole attitude towards Hamas must change by the world community
and by the interlocutors, by Arab nations, by intermediaries.
They all have to understand that Hamas is not a partner in anything.
They simply refuse endlessly to move on and move towards a hostage deal."