Tel Aviv
CNN
—
With the death of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, many Israelis are sensing a window of opportunity to bring back the hostages still held in Gaza – and they are making their voices heard.
Huge crowds of protesters gathered across several cities in Israel on Saturday, demanding Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government make the return of the hostages their top priority — something they believe has not been the case so far.
Sinwar was a hardliner with little interest in negotiating with Israel. The US, which mediated the talks in Cairo, has repeatedly accused him of being one of the main blockers of a ceasefire deal.
His demise could pave the way to a ceasefire agreement. But getting there will depend on Netanyahu.
The prime minister has long been trying to balance the demands of his far-right coalition partners, who seem dead-set on refusing any kind of deal with Hamas, with the increasingly loud calls from Israel’s Western allies, including the US, who are pressuring him to strike an agreement and bring the war in Gaza to an end.
Now he is once again facing large-scale protests calling for him to act.
Eran Nissan, an activist who has been attending near-weekly anti-government protests for months, and was at the gathering in Tel Aviv on Saturday, told CNN he believes many Israelis want Netanyahu to negotiate.
“There’s a solid majority and a consensus in the Israeli society on this, 105 hostages have (already) been brought back in a deal,” he said, in a reference to the week-long ceasefire and hostage exchange that took place in November.
There are 101 hostages still held in Gaza, Israeli authorities say. As many as one-third of them are thought to be dead.
But Nissan said he believed Netanyahu’s government had a reason for prolonging the war.
“(A ceasefire) is not in their interest because they know that once the war is over, they will have to answer questions about how they were complicit in (the security failures that led to the) October 7 (attacks), and that there is going to be a national inquiry, and that there is going to be a demand for elections, and in any poll that you see right now, they’re going to be hit hard,” he said.
Netanyahu has not outlined any strategy on how to capitalize on Sinwar’s death, saying only that Israel will continue to fight “until the victory.”
“This is the beginning of the day after Hamas. Evil has suffered a heavy blow, but the task before us is not yet complete,” he said.
For Yoni Levy, the only victory would be the return of his daughter Naama from Gaza. She had been serving as a lookout, observing the Gaza Strip from the Nahal Oz military base, when Hamas stormed the area and kidnapped her.
Images of her being loaded onto a truck, barefoot and badly beaten, her gray sweatpants soaked in blood, became symbols of the brutality of the October 7 attack.
Yoni Levy said the death of Sinwar had given the government an opportunity to act.
“We killed this horrible guy, but we should not move our focus,” he told CNN.
“This is the time for the prime minister to take the deal, even if we need to stop the war for some time, even if we have to release some of the murderous people from their side, now is the time to take the extra steps which we did not agree to take before,” he said.
Levy spoke to CNN last week at Hostages Square – the plaza outside the Museum of Art in Tel Aviv where families and supporters of those held in Gaza have been meeting nearly every week since the October 7 attacks.
For Levy, this particular protest was special. Dozens of women, who had either known Naama or served in a similar military role as her, gathered at the square to call for her release. They wore the same clothes as Naama had on October 7 and used red paint on their bodies to symbolize the injuries she sustained in the attack.
The woman who came up with the idea, Amit Frid, said Naama should already “be home.”
“She should have been home the day after the attack, she should have been home yesterday, today, tomorrow,” she told CNN.
When Hamas confirmed Sinwar’s death on Friday, the group said it would not free its remaining hostages until Israel ended the war, fully withdrew from Gaza, and released Palestinian prisoners. Similarly, Netanyahu too vowed to keep fighting.
But in a hint that he is willing to talk, shortly after Sinwar’s death was announced, Netanyahu made a direct offer to anyone holding hostages in Gaza, saying that whoever lay down their arms and returned hostages to Israel would be let go alive.
Shira Efron, a security expert from the Israel Policy Forum, said the window of opportunity to act could be small, given that Hamas would get a new formal leader soon.
“Terrorists tend to be pretty fungible. You always find new ones,” she said, adding that Sinwar’s younger brother Mohammed, a hardliner who is believed to be just as ruthless as Yahya, was among the top contenders.
She said that Israel needed to figure out quickly who to talk to – and provide avenues for those who wanted to reach out.
“Let’s just say that someone is convinced that this is the time to lay down their arms and give in, or provide information about a hostage in return for amnesty or a cash award, who do they even call now?,” she asked.
Some of the hostages may not even be held by Hamas, having been taken by other groups and individuals and it is these people that Israel is trying to appeal to now.
Over the weekend, the Israeli military began dropping leaflets featuring a photo of Sinwar’s lifeless body in Gaza promising free passage to anyone who helped to return the hostages.
Next to it, a call out: “Sinwar destroyed your lives … Hamas will not govern Gaza anymore. Finally, the opportunity has come for you to be liberated from its tyranny. Whoever lays down their weapon and returns the abductees to us, we will allow them to leave and live in peace.”