Standing up to Netanyahu: Five concrete fronts to counter Israel’s genocide in Gaza
The bodies of Palestinians killed during Israel’s war on Gaza are buried in a mass grave on 7 March 2024
Ramzy Baroud writes in The Palestine Chronicle on 13 August 2026:
It is now official: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has flatly rejected the core conditions of the Board of Peace framework, explicitly stating that Israel will neither adhere to a ceasefire nor withdraw its forces from Gaza.
During a cabinet meeting on Sunday, Netanyahu stated with unambiguous language: “Israel rejects the 15-point document published by the Board of Peace for Gaza”.
In a previous conversation with lead envoy Nickolay Mladenov, Netanyahu set conditions—such as demanding unilateral operational freedom for the Israeli military to strike inside Gaza at will—that render a genuine peace agreement structurally impossible.
The Israeli army leadership, under Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir, reinforced this posture by outlining three uncompromising “red lines” to the political establishment: complete operational freedom to eliminate perceived threats anywhere in the Strip, strict control over all weapons entering or exiting Gaza, and zero military withdrawal unless Hamas is completely disarmed.
One can fault Netanyahu for many things, including ongoing genocide. But in recent years, he has been remarkably straightforward about his intentions; therefore, no one can claim that Netanyahu has fooled anyone.
Earlier this year, while speaking at a conference in an occupied West Bank settlement, Netanyahu explicitly boasted that he had instructed the Israeli military to expand its physical footprint and permanently occupy at least 70 percent of the Gaza Strip—a massive expansion far beyond the temporary administrative demarcation lines established in previous truce outlines.
Meanwhile, his far-right ministers have pushed the government’s rejectionist stance even further. Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Missions Minister Orit Strock issued a joint demand for an emergency cabinet meeting to roll back authorization for the deployment of the International Stabilization Force (ISF).
The ISF, designed under the Board of Peace framework as a transitional peacekeeping body, was meant to oversee humanitarian security, starting with pilot recovery zones in Rafah.
Yet Smotrich and Strock claimed the security cabinet was “misled” into approving the force, arguing that allowing international personnel into Gaza endangers Israeli operational freedom and directly contradicts their explicit war aims.
These latest moves, along with the military’s strict “red lines,” confirm what recent months of relentless bombardment have made clear: the Israeli government has no intention of ending its genocide in Gaza or relinquishing control over the besieged and devastated territory.
But highlighting such positions will make no difference, aside from once more accentuating Israel’s total lack of desire for peace and its intention to perpetuate conflict. While true, such realization on its own is worthless considering that what is taking place in Gaza and the West Bank is beyond horrific, and that the daily killing of Palestinians makes the term “ceasefire” a cruel joke.