Netanyahu signals progress on hostage deal but gives no timeline

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel said Monday that "progress" was being made toward a deal with Hamas to release hostages held captive in the Gaza Strip for more than a year but dismissed pressure to act faster.

"We are taking significant actions on all levels to secure our loved ones' release," Netanyahu said at a hearing called by opposition lawmakers in Israel's parliament that he was obligated to attend. "I would like to tell you, with caution: There is some progress."

But he added, "I don't know how long it will take."

Netanyahu did not provide any details about the negotiations to secure the release of about 100 people who remain captive in Gaza -- about a third of whom are believed to be dead, according to Israeli authorities. In exchange for their release, a number of Palestinians imprisoned in Israel would be freed, according to the outlines of the deal.

The Israeli leader gave three primary reasons for the progress he cited, a list that essentially served as a defense of his leadership and his prosecution of the war after more than a year of fighting in the Gaza Strip.

"First, Yahya Sinwar is no longer with us," he said, referring to the Hamas leader who orchestrated the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel and who was killed in Gaza this past October. Second, Netanyahu said, Hamas has been unable to get the help it expected from its sponsor, Iran, and an ally, the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, because "they are busy licking their wounds" after Israeli attacks. Finally, he said, Hamas was weakened by Israel's "unrelenting military pressure in Gaza."

The prime minister's pledge to secure the hostages' release by any means necessary did little to quell the anger of opposition lawmakers, many of whom shouted over him and some of whom were ejected from parliament during the address. Yorai Lahav-Hertzanu, a lawmaker from the centrist Yesh Atid party, was ushered out as he shouted that Netanyahu had betrayed the hostages.

At times, Netanyahu himself grew angry and dismissed the criticisms. "Don't lecture me," he warned lawmakers in the audience, saying, "Reality is greater than your contempt and mockery."

He recalled that critics had doubted him throughout the war and had pressured him to make deals both with Hamas and Hezbollah before he deemed the timing and conditions right. Ultimately, Netanyahu said, he refused to cave in to those pressures, a decision he insisted had made a "huge difference" in creating the conditions for Israeli military victories and security, along with the hostages' ultimate release.

Netanyahu defended his approach as one that had created "opportunities to expand the circle of peace" in the Middle East, and said that Israel's military actions had been helping drive "tectonic changes" in the region.

The prime minister also alluded to Israeli strikes in Yemen targeting the Houthis in retaliation for a missile strike in Tel Aviv, Israel, by the militants Saturday morning. He said there would be more such actions to come from Israel. Shortly afterward, Defense Minister Israel Katz issued a similar statement saying that Israel would continue to hit strategic Houthi infrastructure and pledging to "behead its leaders."

Katz's statement also appeared to claim Israeli responsibility for the assassination of Hamas' political leader, Ismail Haniyeh, in Tehran, Iran's capital, in July, while hinting that a similar fate may await Houthi leaders.

"Just as we have done with Haniyeh, Sinwar and Nasrallah in Tehran, Gaza and Lebanon," Katz said -- referring to the slain Hamas leaders, as well as Hezbollah's chief, Hassan Nasrallah, who was assassinated in Lebanon in late September -- "so we will do in Hodeida and Sanaa," two cities in Yemen.

The threats to act in Yemen come as the devastating Israeli military campaign in Gaza has drawn intense criticism from around the world and fueled debate in Israel over Netanyahu's approach.

More than 45,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the war began last year, according to the local health authorities, who don't distinguish between civilians and combatants. The enclave's infrastructure has been destroyed; lawlessness is rampant; medicine, shelter and basics are in severely short supply; and many Palestinians have faced hunger and disease amid repeated displacement and bombings over more than a year.

Some of the hostages, including three soldiers, have most likely been mistakenly killed by Israeli airstrikes in Gaza, the Israeli military said. And the military said this month that six hostages found dead in a Hamas tunnel in Gaza over the summer had most likely been shot by their captors in February, around the time that an Israeli airstrike hit near the tunnel where they were being held.

Relatives of the captives argue that every day that passes lessens the chances that those who are still alive will survive, and many have pushed for a ceasefire deal. Negotiations gained steam this month, mediators say, but it seems there will be no holiday miracles when it comes to a ceasefire and the release of hostages.

Netanyahu acknowledged that the hostages' plight cast a shadow on Israelis' celebrations before Hanukkah, a festival of lights, even as he spoke of the country's "tremendous" achievements.

"Those still held in the darkness, in Hamas' dungeons," he said, "the mission of their release stands at the forefront of our concerns."