Protests erupt in Israel after Netanyahu fires defence minister

Protests have erupted in Israel after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fired the country’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant.

Netanyahu said a “crisis of trust” between the two leaders led to his decision, adding that his trust in Gallant had “eroded” in recent months and Foreign Min­ister Israel Katz would step in to replace him.

Gallant said his removal was due to disagreement on three issues, in­cluding his belief that it is possible to get the remaining hostages back from Gaza if Israel makes “painful concessions” which it “can bear”.

Many protesters on the streets were calling for Netanyahu to resign, and demanding the new de­fence minister prioritise a hostage deal.

Netanyahu and Gallant have long had a divisive working re­lationship. During the past year, there have been reports of shout­ing matches between the two men over Israel’s war strategy.

The former defence minister has also been unhappy at plans to continue to allow Israel’s Ultra Or­thodox citizens to be exempt from serving in the military.

Months before the start of the war in Gaza in October 2023, Netanyahu had fired Gallant over political differences, before rein­stating him following major public outcry.

But on Tuesday Netanyahu said: “In the midst of a war, more than ever, full trust is required between the prime minister and the minister of defence”.

He said although there had been trust and “fruitful work” in the first months of the war, “during the last months this trust cracked”.

Netanyahu added that “signifi­cant gaps were discovered between me and Gallant in the management of the campaign”.

These were “accompanied by statements and actions that contra­dict the decisions of the govern­ment,” he added.

Following the news, Gallant posted on social media that the “security of the state of Israel was and will always remain the mission of my life”.

He later released a full state­ment on Tuesday night saying his removal from office had been “the result of disagreement on three issues”.

He believed there should be no exceptions for military service, that a national inquiry was needed to learn lessons, and the hostages should be brought back as soon as possible.

In reference to the hostages, he said: “I determine that it is possi­ble to achieve this goal. It requires painful concessions, which the state of Israel can carry and the IDF can bear.”

One of those protesting follow­ing the announcement, Yair Amit, said Netanyahu is endangering the whole country and called on the prime minister to “step down from his office and to let serious people lead Israel”.

Some protesters lit fires on the Ayalon Highway and blocked traf­fic in both directions, according to Israeli media.

A group representing the fam­ilies of people taken hostage by Hamas in its 7 October attack also condemned Netanyahu’s dismissal of Gallant, calling it a continu­ation of efforts to “torpedo” a release deal.

The Hostages and Missing Fam­ilies Forum called on the incom­ing defence minister to “express an explicit commitment to the end of the war and to carry out a comprehensive deal for the imme­diate return of all the abductees”.

—BBC