Star Metro - Gaza war deepens Israel's divides

Hostage families and peace activists want Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government to secure a ceasefire with Hamas and free the remaining captives abducted during the October 2023 Hamas attacks.

Right-wing members of Netanyahu's cabinet, meanwhile, want to seize the moment to occupy and annex more Palestinian land, at the risk of sparking further international criticism.

The debate has divided the country and strained private relationships, undermining national unity at Israel's moment of greatest need in the midst of its longest war.

"As the war continues we become more and more divided," said Emanuel Yitzchak Levi, a 29-year-old poet, schoolteacher and peace activist from Israel's religious left who attended a peace meeting at Tel Aviv's Dizengoff Square.

"It's really hard to keep being a friend, or family, a good son, a good brother to someone that's -- from your point of view -- supporting crimes against humanity," he told AFP.

"And I think it's also hard for them to support me if they think I betrayed my own country."

As if to underline this point, a tall, dark-haired cyclist angered by the gathering pulled up his bike to shout "traitors" at the attendees and to accuse activists of playing into Hamas's hands.

- No flowers -

Dvir Berko, a 36-year-old worker at one of the city's many IT startups, paused his scooter journey across downtown Tel Aviv to share a more reasoned critique of the peace activists' call for a ceasefire.

Berko and others accused international bodies of exaggerating the threat of starvation in Gaza, and he told AFP that Israel should withhold aid until the remaining 49 hostages are freed.

"The Palestinian people, they're controlled by Hamas. Hamas takes their food. Hamas starts this war and, in every war that happens, bad things are going to happen. You're not going to send the other side flowers," he argued.

"So, if they open a war, they should realise and understand what's going to happen after they open the war."

The raised voices in Tel Aviv reflect a deepening polarisation in Israeli society since Hamas's October 2023 attacks left 1,219 people dead, independent journalist Meron Rapoport told AFP.

Rapoport, a former senior editor at liberal daily Haaretz, noted that Israel had been divided before the latest conflict, and had even seen huge anti-corruption protests against Netanyahu and perceived threats to judicial independence.

Hamas's attack initially triggered a wave of national unity, but as the conflict has dragged on and Israel's conduct has come under international criticism, attitudes on the right and left have diverged and hardened.

- Political motives -

"The moment Hamas acted there was a coming together," Rapoport said. "Nearly everyone saw it as a just war.

"As the war went on it has made people come to the conclusion that the central motivations are not military reasons but political ones."

According to a survey conducted between July 24 and 28 by the Institute for National Security Studies, with 803 Jewish and 151 Arab respondents, Israelis narrowly see Hamas as primarily to blame for the delay in reaching a deal on freeing the hostages.

Only 24 percent of Israeli Jews are distressed or "very distressed" by the humanitarian situation in Gaza -- where, according to UN-mandated reports, "a famine is unfolding" and Palestinian civilians are often killed while seeking food.

But there is support for the families of the Israeli hostages, many of whom have accused Netanyahu of prolonging the war artificially to strengthen his own political position.

"In Israel there's a mandatory army service," said Mika Almog, 50, an author and peace activist with the It's Time Coalition.

"So these soldiers are our children and they are being sent to die in a false criminal war that is still going on for nothing other than political reasons."

In an open letter published Monday, 550 former top diplomats, military officers and spy chiefs urged US President Donald Trump to tell Netanyahu that the military stage of the war was already won and he must now focus on a hostage deal.

"At first this war was a just war, a defensive war, but when we achieved all military objectives, this war ceased to be a just war," said Ami Ayalon, former director of the Shin Bet security service.

The conflict "is leading the State of Israel to lose its security and identity", he warned in a video released to accompany the letter.

This declaration by the security officers -- those who until recently prosecuted Israel's overt and clandestine wars -- echoed the views of the veteran peace activists that have long protested against them.

- 'Awful period' -

Biblical archaeologist and kibbutz resident Avi Ofer is 70 years old and has long campaigned for peace between Israelis and Palestinians.

He and fellow activists wore yellow ribbons with the length in days of the war written on it: "667".

The rangy historian was close to tears as he told AFP: "This is the most awful period in my life."

"Yes, Hamas are war criminals. We know what they do. The war was justified at first. At the beginning it was not a genocide," he said.

Not many Israelis use the term "genocide", but they are aware that the International Court of Justice (ICJ) is considering whether to rule on a complaint that the country has breached the Genocide Convention.

While only a few are anguished about the threat of starvation and violence hanging over their neighbours, many are worried that Israel may become an international pariah -- and that their conscript sons and daughters be treated like war crimes suspects when abroad.

Israel and Netanyahu -- with support from the United States -- have denounced the case in The Hague.

O.Lessard--SMC