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Israel’s Netanyahu Says Military Pressure Needed to Free Hostages

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, chairs a cabinet meeting at the Kirya military base, which houses the Israeli Ministry of Defence, in Tel Aviv, Israel, 24 December 2023. (EPA)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, chairs a cabinet meeting at the Kirya military base, which houses the Israeli Ministry of Defence, in Tel Aviv, Israel, 24 December 2023. (EPA)
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Israel’s Netanyahu Says Military Pressure Needed to Free Hostages

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, chairs a cabinet meeting at the Kirya military base, which houses the Israeli Ministry of Defence, in Tel Aviv, Israel, 24 December 2023. (EPA)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, chairs a cabinet meeting at the Kirya military base, which houses the Israeli Ministry of Defence, in Tel Aviv, Israel, 24 December 2023. (EPA)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that Israel would not succeed in freeing the remaining hostages held in Gaza without applying military pressure.

"We wouldn't have succeeded up until now to release more than 100 hostages without military pressure," Netanyahu said during a speech in Israel's parliament. "And we won't succeed at releasing all the hostages without military pressure."

A deal brokered in late November by the US, Qatar and Egypt saw the release of more than 100 of the estimated 240 hostages who were taken captive to Gaza during an attack by Hamas militants on Oct. 7.

"Military pressure, operational pressure and political pressure and that's why there is one thing we won't do - we will not stop fighting," Netanyahu said.

Hostages' family members sat in the chamber looking down on the premier, holding posters of their relatives behind the plexiglass and intermittently interrupting him.

"Now! Now! Now!" the family members shouted.

Hamas and the allied Islamic Jihad rejected on Monday an Egyptian proposal that they relinquish power in the Gaza Strip in return for a permanent ceasefire, two Egyptian security sources told Reuters.

Three Israeli hostages were killed mistakenly in Gaza by Israeli forces earlier this month.

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Force Alone Will Not Lead to Israel’s Security, France Says

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot holds a press conference, on the first anniversary of the Hamas-led deadly October 7 attack on Israel, at the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, October 7, 2024. (Reuters)
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot holds a press conference, on the first anniversary of the Hamas-led deadly October 7 attack on Israel, at the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, October 7, 2024. (Reuters)
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Force Alone Will Not Lead to Israel’s Security, France Says

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot holds a press conference, on the first anniversary of the Hamas-led deadly October 7 attack on Israel, at the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, October 7, 2024. (Reuters)
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot holds a press conference, on the first anniversary of the Hamas-led deadly October 7 attack on Israel, at the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, October 7, 2024. (Reuters)

Israel's security cannot be guaranteed with military force alone and will require a diplomatic solution, France's foreign minister said on Monday, and Paris would continue efforts to achieve a ceasefire in Lebanon.

Speaking at the end of a four-day tour of the Middle East, Jean-Noel Barrot was in Israel on Monday to mark a year since Palestinian Hamas fighters crossed into Israel killing around 1,200 people and taking about 250 hostage back to Gaza.

The assault triggered an Israeli military campaign in Gaza that has killed nearly 42,000 Palestinians, according to the enclave's health ministry. The war has spread conflict across the region with Israel stepping up military operations over its northern border in Lebanon against Hezbollah, a Hamas ally.

"Force alone cannot guarantee the security of Israel, your security. Military success cannot be a substitute for a political perspective," Barrot told a news conference in Jerusalem.

"To bring the hostages home to their loved ones, to allow the displaced to return home in the north (of Israel), after a year of war, the time for diplomacy has come."

Barrot's arrival in Israel, where about 180,000 French citizens live, came at a tricky time in Franco-Israeli relations after President Emmanuel Macron was firmly rebuffed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the weekend.

Macron had called for a de facto arms embargo on Israel and, in a veiled attack on the US, said countries that both supplied weapons and called for a ceasefire where they were being used in conflict were being incoherent. French arms supplies to Israel are minimal.

Barrot reiterated that it was odd to call for a ceasefire while giving offensive weapons. He said that France, as a staunch defender of Israel's security, felt it was vital to be frank about the ongoing suffering of civilians in Gaza, but also the military operation now in southern Lebanon.

France worked with the United States in trying to secure a ceasefire in Lebanon at the end of September.

Diplomatic sources had at the time believed this had secured a temporary truce, a day before Israel heavily bombed Beirut's southern suburbs, killing longtime Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah.

"We have a responsibility to act today to avoid Lebanon finding itself in a short horizon in a dramatic situation like Syria found itself a few years ago," Barrot said.

Ceasefire proposals put forward together with Washington remain on the table, he said.