“Don’t feed the crocodile because it will come after you after it devours Israel,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appealed to European leaders after emphasising “the onus is on Hamas” to accept the US-brokered deal and return the hostages it still holds, in an exclusive Euronews interview on Sunday.
The Israeli premier spoke to Euronews just days before the two-year anniversary of the 7 October 2023 attack on southern Israel, when Hamas-led militants killed 1,200 people and took around 250 hostage.
Hamas currently holds 48 hostages, around 20 of whom are believed to be still alive.
Under the Washington-led plan, which US President Donald Trump unveiled earlier this week alongside Netanyahu, Hamas would immediately release the remaining hostages, living and dead.
The militant group would also give up power in Gaza and surrender its arms.
In return, Israel would halt its offensive and withdraw from much of the territory, release hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and allow an influx of humanitarian aid and eventual reconstruction.
The deal, if Hamas accepts it, “could be the beginning of the end of the war,” Netanyahu told Euronews. “The reason Hamas agreed to this deal in the first place is because we acted militarily against their main stronghold,” he stated. “As a result Hamas became more flexible as they realised the end is near.”
“Let’s hope we can finish it the easy way and not the hard way,” he stated.
A Hamas official said earlier this week that some elements of the plan are unacceptable and need to be amended, without elaborating. Netanyahu has rejected that, saying Hamas must surrender and disarm without reservations.
“It can’t partially accept it, it has to accept it in full,” he told Euronews. “If we actually set up a civilian administration in Gaza that doesn’t educate its children not to hate Israel, to kill Jews everywhere … then I think the whole region can have a much more positive and peaceful future.”
If Hamas refuses to accept the deal in its entirety, Netanyahu said, the US will fully back Israel in its efforts to end the war militarily.
“Gazans are now fighting Hamas, because they are seeing now hope of getting rid of Hamas,” he said.
“I think everybody realises Hamas rule has come to an end,” Netanyahu told Euronews. “We need a system of division of responsibility. In Gaza we’ll need a civilian administration administered not by people committed to Israel’s destruction,” he explained.
The territory of some 2 million Palestinians would be placed under international governance, with Trump himself and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair overseeing it. The plan provides no path for eventual reunification with the Israeli-occupied West Bank in a future Palestinian state.
Most of Hamas’ top leaders in Gaza and thousands of its fighters have already been killed, but it still has influence in areas not controlled by the Israeli military and launches sporadic attacks that have killed and wounded Israeli soldiers.
Hamas has held firm to its position that it will only release the remaining hostages, its sole bargaining chip, in exchange for a lasting ceasefire and a full Israeli military withdrawal.
‘I hope that Europe changes its direction’
Israel has sought to ramp up pressure on Hamas since unilaterally ending an earlier ceasefire in March, stating it wanted to eradicate the militant group from Gaza and dismantle its network of tunnels and other facilities.
It sealed the territory off from food, medicine and other goods for more than two months and has seized, flattened and largely depopulated large areas of the Strip.
Israel’s ongoing military campaign in the Strip has resulted in the deaths of 67,000 Palestinians, according to the figures shared by the Hamas-led Gaza health ministry, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants in its death toll.
Netanyahu said the information coming out of Gaza was “propaganda”, stating that the international media reports have become “distorted” as Europe’s leaders “caved in to terror”.
“Europe has been absent because Europe has caved in to Hamas terrorism,” Netanyahu said, stating that the recent slew of recognition of the state of Palestine was the “ultimate reward to Hamas after the greatest massacre against Jews since the Holocaust.”
He said that Europe has to stand up to the terrorist threat, stating that Israel was “fighting the battle of the free world, to prevent barbarians from storming Europe.”
An example of it was the “Iran terror access which we have rolled back.” “Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, all these fanatic forces not just against Israel, chanting ‘Death to America’ and by the way ‘death to Europe’ between (the lines) … for the future of the world,” Netanyahu said.
“I hope that Europe changes its direction,” he pointed out. ”We are fighting the battle of the free world, to prevent barbarians from storming Europe.”
Euronews will air the full interview with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tonight at 8:30 pm CEST.