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Ya'alon: Division among ministers bolstered Hamas' position

September 25, 2014 at 12:12 pm

Israeli Defence Minister Moshe Ya’alon has slammed members of the security cabinet over internal disputes during the war on the Gaza Strip, noting that it only reinforced Hamas’s position.

Speaking to Israeli radio, Ya’alon claimed that Hamas’s leadership would have stopped launching its rockets after only two weeks of the war, but the internal division among cabinet ministers pushed it to carry on firing its rockets.

Israel National news quoted him as saying that Hamas was ready for a ceasefire, “But someone said to them, ‘look how divided they are! They are about to collapse – why stop the [rocket] fire now?'”

“It is impossible to downplay how crucial and damaging this was,” he added.

Continuing his attack, he said: “I have never seen a Cabinet like this – and I have been in Cabinets now for 20 years.” He continued: “It cannot be during an operation, when we bury our dead, to give [the enemy] the sense that we are losing.”

The minister pointed out that Hamas was always well aware of these divisions as it closely follows Israeli domestic politics. He also said that the divisions were clear throughout the entire campaign, because of the sharp public arguments and severe criticisms by ministers.