Top Israeli official Benny Gantz resigns from government over Netanyahu’s Gaza war strategy
Benny Gantz, a centrist member of Israel’s three-man war cabinet, announced his resignation on Sunday, accusing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of mismanaging the war effort in Gaza and putting his own “political survival” over the country’s security needs.
The move does not immediately pose a threat to Netanyahu, who still controls a majority coalition in Israel’s parliament, the Knesset. But the Israeli leader becomes more heavily reliant on his far-right allies.
Netanyahu is “preventing true victory” and “making empty promises,” Gantz said, adding that the country needs to take a different direction as he expects the fighting to continue for years to come.
The popular former military chief joined Netanyahu’s government shortly after the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack on Israel in a show of unity.
His presence also boosted Israel’s credibility with its international partners. Gantz has good working relations with U.S. officials.
Gantz had previously said he would leave the government by June 8 if Netanyahu did not formulate a new plan for postwar Gaza.
He scrapped a planned news conference Saturday night after four Israeli hostages were dramatically rescued from Gaza earlier in the day in Israel’s largest such operation since the eight-month war began.
At least 274 Palestinians, including children, were killed in the assault, Gaza health officials said.
Gantz called for Israel to hold elections in the fall and encouraged the third member of the war cabinet, Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, to “do the right thing” and resign from the government as well.
The international community is growing more critical of Israel’s military operation in Gaza after accusations of genocide, talk of arrest warrants and airstrikes that killed civilians in Rafah. Andrew Chang breaks down the global shift in stance, and how Israel is responding to the pressure.
Gallant has previously said he would resign if Israel chose to reoccupy Gaza, and he encouraged the government to make plans for a Palestinian administration.
On Saturday, Netanyahu had urged Gantz not to leave the emergency wartime government.
“This is the time for unity, not for division,” he said, in a direct plea to Gantz.
Gantz’s decision to leave is largely “a symbolic move” due to his frustration with Netanyahu, said Gideon Rahat, chair of the political science department at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
He noted it could further increase Netanyahu’s reliance on extremist, right-wing members of his government led by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.
“I think the outside world, especially the United States, is not very happy about it, because they see Gantz and his party as the more responsible people within this government,” Rahat said.
Hamas took some 250 hostages during the Oct. 7 attack that killed about 1,200 people, according to Israel tallies. About half were released during a weeklong ceasefire in November. About 120 hostages remain, with 43 pronounced dead.
At least 36,700 Palestinians have been killed in the fighting, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between fighters and civilians.
Published at Fri, 26 Jan 2024 09:01:20 +0000
Solemn prayers and speeches rang out inside the Golden Temple in Amritsar, the holiest of sites in the Sikh religion, as the northern state of Punjab marked the 40th anniversary of a deadly Indian military operation. Operation Blue Star, as it was called, left hundreds dead and damaged the temple’s inner shrine.
At the same time, a group of about 200 supporters of an independent Sikh state called Khalistan were gathered in the corner of the temple’s compound, chanting slogans and declaring that the “Sikh religious flag is flying high.”
“Sikhs cannot forget this day,” said 27-year-old student Harmandeep Singh after the Thursday ceremony. “The day on which our [inner shrine] was attacked.”
The military siege in June 1984 was ordered by India’s then-prime minister Indira Gandhi. The aim was to flush out militant separatist Sikh leader Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and his armed followers, barricaded inside the Golden Temple, and stifle the burgeoning Khalistan movement for an independent homeland.
Official figures put the death toll at around 400 people. Sikh groups dispute that figure and say the number of people that died was in the thousands.
Gandhi would later be assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards in apparent retaliation for the bloodshed at the temple. That, in turn, triggered days of anti-Sikh riots across India during which several thousand people died. The deadly incident also sparked years of violence and turmoil in Punjab.
Bitter feelings linger
The bitterness and rancour over the attack within India’s Sikh community remains strong 40 years later, even among the younger generation.
“The Indian state attacked a pilgrimage temple — a place of peace,” said student Manmohan Singh, 24.
“They used tanks, helicopters, commandos. Full [force]. To kill Sikhs,” added his friend, Harmandeep Singh, who had travelled from the Punjab town of Moga, more than 100 kilometres away, for the ceremony.
“Why was that needed, that police would enter into that premises?”
Satpal Singh Danish, 75, was a photojournalist in Amritsar at the time and documented the days-long armed forces raid after first shots were fired on June 1, 1984.
It was hard to gauge how many army officers were surrounding the temple in the days preceding the attack because they were scattered in different locations, he told CBC News.
But when the military stormed inside, it suddenly became very clear.
“I realized that this was a war,” he said. The fear in the city was intense, the photographer recalled, especially when the reality hit the residents that the military operation was “an attack on a religious place … that cannot be erased.”
For Beant Singh, 81, whose brother was killed inside the temple during the military assault, the yearly commemoration ceremonies are increasingly difficult to attend because of his age.
But the pain associated with Operation Blue Star will never fade, he said in an interview.
Singh’s brother, Sabeg Singh, was a former general in the Indian army who was suspended and subsequently became close to the militant Sikh leaders.
“We weren’t even allowed to see [my brother’s] body, and the government didn’t give us his belongings,” Singh said.
“This is a huge black mark on Indira Gandhi and the Indian government,” he said. His community “will never forgive” the government, he added.
Discrimination continues
Forty years after Indian armed forces stormed the Golden Temple, there was a sense among some of those who gathered for the Thursday ceremonies — held annually on June 6 to commemorate the main day of the assault — that the current government, under newly re-elected Prime Minister Narendra Modi, is continuing the discrimination against Sikhs.
“There is not much difference between the government of Indira Gandhi and the current government,” said student activist Harshwinder Singh, 19.
Singh believes there is a double standard when it comes to nationalist rhetoric from the Hindu majority compared to the minority Sikh community, which make up 1.7 per cent of the population of India but are the majority in Punjab state.
“Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other leaders, they are directly talking about Hindu Rashtra on the stage,” Singh said, referring to the ruling BJP party’s rhetoric about India as a Hindu nation first. “And nothing happens to them. But if the Sikhs ask for Khalistan, they are sent to jails.”
He means Amritpal Singh, a self-styled preacher and Khalistani activist who has fashioned himself as a successor to Bhindranwale, the Sikh leader killed during Operation Blue Star.
Amritpal Singh was the subject of a weeks-long manhunt in April 2023, before being caught and jailed. He ran as an independent in the recent Indian general election from his jail cell and won a seat.
The son of one of Indira Gandhi’s assassins, Sarabjeet Singh Khalsa, also secured a seat in India’s Parliament.
On the streets of Punjab, many Sikhs reject the idea of a separate Khalistan and fear the idea is being exaggerated on social media. CBC’s South Asia correspondent Salimah Shivji breaks down why.
But for others, the ceremony to commemorate Operation Blue Star is about educating future generations, and not about politics.
“We have to remember,” said newlywed Prableen Kaur, visiting Amritsar from India’s capital Delhi. “To not let it happen again.”
She said it’s especially important under an Indian government that doesn’t always show regard for its religious minorities.
“Sikhs are still a minority in this country and you never know in this nation.”
Published at Sun, 09 Jun 2024 08:00:00 +0000
