By Asher Kaufman
The ceasefire in Gaza appears to be over.
And while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has sought to blame Hamas for the resumption of fighting that killed more than 400 Palestinians on March 18, 2025 – “only the beginning,” Netanyahu warned – the truth is the seeds of the renewed violence are to be found in Israeli domestic politics.
Ever since the first phase of the ceasefire came into effect in January, Israeli politics experts – myself included – have flagged a likely insurmountable problem. And that is the execution of the plan’s second phase – which, if implemented, would see full withdrawal of Israeli military forces from the Gaza Strip in exchange for the release of the remaining hostages – is a nonstarter for far-right elements in the Israeli ruling coalition that Netanyahu relies on for his political survival.
Withdrawing from the Gaza Strip runs counter to the maximalist ideologies of key members of Netanyahu’s government, including some in his own party, Likud. Rather, their stated position is for Israel to remain in control of the enclave and to push as many Palestinians as possible out of it. It is why many in Netanyahu’s government cheered when President Donald Trump indicated that Palestinians should be cleared from Gaza to make way for a massive reconstruction project led by the United States.
As an expert on Israeli history and a professor of peace studies, I believe the far-right vision for post-conflict Gaza shared by parts of Netanyahu’s government is incompatible with the ceasefire plan. But increasingly, it appears to chime with the views of some in the U.S. administration – which, as de facto sponsor of the ceasefire, may have been the only entity that could have held the Israeli government to its terms.
Efforts to transform judiciary
It is true Hamas is responsible for delays and manipulations during the first phase of the ceasefire deal. It also turned hostage releases into propaganda spectacles, tormenting both the families of captives and much of Israeli society in the process.
But in my view, the resumption of war is first and foremost tied to domestic Israeli currents that predate even the Oct. 7, 2023, attack that sparked the deadliest fighting between Israelis and Palestinians since the 1948 war. It can be traced back to Netanyahu’s efforts to transform the political system in Israel and increase the power of the executive and legislative branches while weakening the judiciary.
Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post via Getty Images
Since coming to power in January 2023, Netanyahu’s hard-right government has made significant efforts to turn independent institutions such as the attorney general’s office and the police into compliant arms of the government by seeking to place government loyalists in charge of both.
Prolonging the war
In 2023, a sustained and massive protest movement slowed Netanyahu’s attempts to overhaul the country’s judiciary.
And then came the Hamas massacre on Oct. 7.
Many Israeli commentators hoped that the attack would force the government to reconsider its efforts to carry out what some described as a legal coup, in a show of national unity.
But Netanyahu and his government had other plans.
After an initial hostage deal in November 2023 failed to yield a wider breakthrough, people gradually began to question whether Netanyahu’s primary interest was to prolong the war in the belief that doing so might be the best way to save his political career and revive his assault on the judiciary.
Such a view has solid foundations. Having been indicted in November 2019 on breach of trust, fraud and corruption charges, Netanyahu was presented with an opportunity to muddy the logic of the long-running legal proceedings: He could hardy stand trial while defending a nation at war. The prosecution is still ongoing, but the resumption of fighting has, again, meant that Netanyahu has reason to delay his testimony.
Meanwhile, war also provides cover for Netanyahu to neuter some of his fiercest critics. In the months after the Oct. 7 attack, Netanyahu systematically removed from office antagonistic members of the security and political leadership, accusing them of being responsible either for the Hamas attack or for the mismanagement of the conflict.
This purging of anti-Netanyahu elements in Israel has ramped up in recent months, with Netanyahu and his allies seeking to replace Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara and fire Ronen Bar, the head of the powerful security agency Shabak, or Shin Bet, which has been carrying out sensitive investigations into Netanyahu’s closest aides.
Shoring up the coalition
The apparent breakdown of the ceasefire now also coincides with growing pressure on Netanyahu from the political right in his ruling coalition.
Under Israeli law, the government must approve its annual budget by the end of March or face being dissolved, something that would trigger fresh elections.
But Netanyahu is facing holdouts among ultra-Orthodox parties over the issue of army drafts. Since the start of the war, there has been tremendous pressure from the wider Israeli public to end the draft exemption for ultra-Orthodox men, who unlike other Israelis did not have to serve in the military. Ultra-Orthodox parties, however, are demanding the opposite: to pass legislation that would formally exempt them from military service.
To secure the vote for the annual budget and stave off elections, Netanyahu needs support – and if it isn’t going to come from the ultra-Orthodox parties, then he needs to shore up far-right members of the coalition.
As a result of the resumption of war, Otzma Yehudit – the far-right party that left Netanyahu’s government in January to protest the ceasefire agreement – has returned to the fold. This gives Netanyahu crucial budget votes. But in effect, it signals that the coalition has no intention of implementing the second phase of the ceasefire plan, withdrawing from Gaza. In effect, it has killed the ceasefire.
The domestic politics of Israel alone is not to blame for the resumption of fighting. There is, too, the changing stance of the U.S. administration.
The transition of presidency from Joe Biden to Donald Trump was a decisive reason for the timing of the ceasefire agreement in January 2025.
But it appears that the administration is reluctant to force Netanyahu to continue to the second phase. Recent statements from Trump suggest that he supports putting extra military pressure on Hamas in Gaza. And by blaming Hamas for the resumption of the war, Trump is tacitly endorsing the position of the Israeli government.
Hamas, in fact, has the most interest in implementing the agreement. Doing so would give the Palestinian militant group the best chance it has of remaining in control of Gaza, while also boasting that it had been responsible for the release of thousands of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli prisons.
Yair Palti/Anadolu via Getty Images
Protests gaining momentum
The majority of Israelis are in favor of ending the war, completing the ceasefire agreement and having Netanyahu resign.
And the anti-government protest movement is gaining steam again as seen in widespread protests in Israeli cities against both the resumption of fighting in Gaza and the attempt to oust security chief Ronen Bar.
Given that the people and the government of Israel appear to be pulling in opposite directions, the resumption of bombing in Gaza can only exacerbate the internal crisis that preceded the war and has ebbed and flowed ever since.
But Netanyahu has seemingly bet that more war is his best chance of remaining in power and completing his plan to transform the country’s political system. Israel is facing an unprecedented situation in which, I would argue, its own prime minister has became the biggest threat to the country’s stability.
Asher Kaufman is Professor of History and Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame.
Pogo says
@As stated
The Gaza ceasefire is dead − Israeli domestic politics killed it
Published: March 19, 2025 9:21am EDT
https://theconversation.com/the-gaza-ceasefire-is-dead-israeli-domestic-politics-killed-it-252569
Also
How power imbalance, misread signs and strategic blunders clouded Hamas’ judgment over Gaza ceasefire
Published: March 19, 2025 5:35pm EDT
https://theconversation.com/how-power-imbalance-misread-signs-and-strategic-blunders-clouded-hamas-judgment-over-gaza-ceasefire-252653
And too
The destruction of America.
JW says
It is amazing to see how two allied countries are being destroyed from within and with help from each other at the same time. A historic mistake! No surprise that World Population Review listed both countries as two of 50 FLAWED democracies (below the 24 countries listed as FULL democracies).
JC says
Considering Hamas didn’t release all the hostages and taking their sweet time regarding it, I think it is fair game to blow up the whole area. Can’t deal with terrorist who first point of their teaching is the destruction of Jews and Israel. Furthermore, their people hate Progressives, any LGBT, and a lot of Western Values.
BillC says
Yahweh commanded Israel “kill all the Palestinians”.
Kennan says
Interesting article, but my only question is this: WHAT CEASEFIRE? We are talking about the second phase of a cease-fire deal that never even had a first phase. we describe the cease-fire by name only. In late January phase one was implied only. All the while isolated bombing campaigns in different parts of Gaza continued, as humanitarian aid was blocked.
So many continue to cavalierly divorce themselves from reality. talking about cease-fires and two state solutions when neither of which exist. Israel has continued to walk away from the negotiating table. Netanyahu and the IDF prove that point by killing Hamas negotiator Ishmael Heneyah in July 2024. The strike was a pinpoint assassination of Heneyah in a guest house in Iran that proved that the” so-called” Gaza war could’ve been handled entirely differently. It also painfully highlighted Israel’s disinterest in negotiations at all by assassinating and negotiator, that’s destroying negotiations altogether.
Benjamin Netanyahu never wanted a two state solution and stated it on many occasions, even having a re-drawn map of Gaza after the war was over.
October 7, 2023 was a terrorist act and a war crime by any rubric. Instead of handling a terrorist act, which is a tactic and meeting that tactic with the pinpoint ism and sophisticated military answers that would go after Hamas, they instead collectively punished every Palestinian in Gaza, every Muslim, Christian, Arab and Jew with collective punishment and bombing that has resulted in well over 100,000 civilian murders both above and below the rubble. 60,000,000 tons of rubble I might add.
October 7 was condemned by the vast majority of the world, but for some reason the corporate media continues to ask Middle East experts and pundits if they condemn October 7, but rarely if ever ask Israeli officials if they condemn what they have done to Palestinian civilians.
I want everybody to imagine that we are living on planet Earth for just a moment. Israel on October 8th and 9th decided to turn water and electric off to starve Palestinians. Not Hamas as they stated, but Palestinians. Conflation is a tactic used by Israel. They conflated Hamas with Palestinians in Gaza. You know what? It worked. Far too many people had the wall pulled over their eyes in front of their eyes. It’s exhausting for me to say that it still happening and the facts are in front of all of our eyes in real time. October 7 didn’t happen in a vacuum.
Let’s just look at the last 20 years. Gazans are living in an open air prison, occupied and run by Netanyahu and Israel. They are subject to checkpoints everywhere, calorie restricted diets,
Nobody in nobody out within the walls of this open air prison we call Gaza. Periodic bombing campaigns called “ mowing the lawn” to dissuade Palestinians from trying to escape as well as reminding them of their place in the social hierarchy. Examples of this would be three high-tech massacres, such as Operation Cast Lead from 2008. Operation Pillar Of Defence from 2012, and Operation Protective Edge from 2014. Operation Cast Lead saw 1400 Palestinians killed including 300 children. 13. Israelis were killed in the pushback of that event. Three were civilian. Hamas was accused of breaking a cease-fire by firing rockets into Israel, even though the rockets(which injured no one) with themselves a response to Israel’s cease-fire violating raid into the Gaza strip, which by the way used flesh incinerating white phosphorus, which is illegal in war. Other operations against Gazans were unprovoked.
Let’s be clear and simple from a chronological standpoint.. A terrorist act by Hamas was met with an industrial terrorism implemented by a supercharged military, the most sophisticated in the region by far thanks to the weaponry and billions of dollars provided by the United States. Electricity as well as water is turned off within the next 48 hours of the attack on October 7 to systematically starve civilians. from that point on and the next 18 months hospitals, mosques, schools, graveyards, refugee camps, UN relief workers as well as facilities, and if you was a civilian or silly enough to try to retrieve, said relief and/or food, you are promptly shot in the head. Man, woman or child. Israel is an equal opportunity sniper. We kill you all. Keep in mind:
Israel was able to pinpoint the assassination of a Hamas negotiator in a guest house in a foreign country,(Iran) but can’t do it in Gaza. Let’s just kill everyone. Eventually, we’ll get somebody from Hamas.
For those of you that are more simple minded and wanna play the Numbers game… Let me put it this way: Israel has managed to kill well over 100 times the number of civilians in Gaza then Hamas killed on October 7, 2023. All life is precious, but the exchange rate on life if you’re an Arab just isn’t that good. They are just Arabs after all.
Once again…(and this is getting exhausting) The Biden administration began this whole genocidal adventure by showing support for Netanyahu by calling himself a Zionist. Red flag #1. He watches as Israel moves civilians from place to place in Gaza. Go to the North, go South,go East,and go West. We will warn you. Tell you to move and bomb you wherever you go. Biden says there is a red line at RAFAH. Civilians wind up in RAFAH and Biden lets Netanyahu attack civilians anyway. Biden wants a cease-fire, but vote seven times against the cease-fire at the UN. The state department no longer answers questions because of their embarrassment. They now know they are truly full of shit. All the while the Biden administration funnels billions and billions and billions of dollars for weapons to continue this ongoing genocide with our tax dollars.
Well, here we are ladies and gentlemen. The genocide baton is passed to the Trump administration who has now promised the complete ethnic cleansing of Gaza. We will take over Gaza and push Palestinians out. Why you ask?? Thank you! Glad you asked!!! He wants to turn Gaza into the Riviera of the Middle East. A billionaire’s playground. move 60,000,000,000 tons of rubble, erase a race of people from existence and broker the biggest real estate deal in the Middle East since the formation of Dubai.
We are the Nazis. Our leaders have formulated an 18 month Holocaust on Palestinians with the support of a modern day Hitler in Benjamin Netanyahu. In many ways this Holocaust is even more glaring than the Holocaust the Jews endured in World War II. This one is being administered in front of the world to see, in real time, 80% of the world, seeing it for the GENOCIDE it is, but the US and Israel expect us to be blind and tell the world that they got it wrong.
In closing, I will just say this: I’m shocked at the media’s insistence on endowing Israel with a monopoly on retaliation that continues to obscure the reality that any Palestinian action against Israel’s brutality in Palestinian territory, institutionalized policy of ethnic cleansing, and habitual massacres seems to be accepted.