'Your job is to ensure Hamas does not lead you astray': Lapid slams Netanyahu for admission
Opposition leader and Yesh Atid chair MK Yair Lapid slammed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu following his admission that Hamas misled Israel in hostage deal negotiations during the second press conference on Sunday.
The 'admission that 'Hamas led us astray' is nothing short of astonishing,' he said on X/Twitter, adding, 'That's exactly your job: to ensure Hamas doesn't lead you astray.'
"Netanyahu – get over it! There is no such thing as a 'green light from the Americans' to conduct negotiations," the Hostages and Missing Families Forum commented.
'These are Israeli citizens, and the State of Israel must lead the moves, demand, and press itself against the mediators for an end to the war and the return of all the hostages home. The responsibility for their lives lies with the Israeli government, not with any other country," they said in a statement.
'The United States has been working tirelessly to free the hostages, end this war, and give civilians in Gaza a future free of Hamas. To do so, we need to place the responsibility where it lies – with Hamas – and hold it and other Gaza terrorists fully accountable. Today's meeting, like so many other recent actions, undermines those efforts,' the US Mission to the UN had posted following the press conferences.
Leader of the Blue and White Party, MK Benny Gantz, who was part of the Israeli security cabinet during some periods of the war, was one of the first to react: 'Too many words, too few actions, too much time.'
Yisrael Beytenu chairman Avigdor Liberman stated: 'The Prime Minister of October 7 continues to lie with brazen audacity. He sacrifices the hostages on the altar of preserving the coalition, just as he sacrifices the regular and reserve soldiers to appease his natural partners – Shas and United Torah Judaism.'
Yair Golan's harsh words over Netanyahu's press conference
'After 22 months of war, after promising that 'we are one step away from total victory,' after 674 days that our hostages are languishing in captivity, Netanyahu declared tonight: 'I have instructed the IDF to defeat Hamas.' Ridiculous,' The Democrats chair MK Yair Golan posted.
'As if until today, IDF soldiers were strolling in Gaza. What we saw tonight is not 'one step from victory' but the most severe security failure in Israel's history,' he said.
'The prime minister of 'Hamas is an asset,' who refuses to defeat the enemy for nearly two years and abandons dozens of Israeli citizens to die in captivity, is a danger to national security. Netanyahu is incapable of winning. He will not release the hostages. He is an utter failure. Israel will only win after he and his government are sent packing,' Golan concluded.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum addressed Netanyahu on Monday, asking him to publicly clarify his remarks at yesterday's press conference in response to a reporter's question, in which he ignored the fallen hostages. "He who abandons fallen ones ends up abandoning lives," the forum's address read.
Uri Sela contributed to this report.
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