Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Israeli citizens of challenging days ahead as he pushed back against Iranian threats of retribution in the aftermath of the twin assassinations in Beirut and Tehran.
“Challenging days are before us,” and “we have heard threats from all sides,” Netanyahu stated.
“We are prepared for any scenario, and we will stand united and determined against any threat. Israel will exact a very heavy price for aggression against us from whatever quarter,” he stressed.
He delivered a short livestream statement in the aftermath of the killings of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh on Wednesday morning and Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr on Tuesday night.
No responsibility for Haniyeh elimination
Netanyahu did not take responsibility for Haniyeh’s assassination, which is widely believed to have been carried out by Israel.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Sayyed Ali Khamenei posted on X that “following this bitter, tragic event which has taken place within the borders of the Islamic Republic, it is our duty to take revenge.”
The New York Times reported on Wednesday night that Khamenei had ordered a direct attack on Israel.
US Secretary of State Lloyd Austin told reporters, “I don’t think war is inevitable.” He added, “If Israel is attacked, we certainly will help defend Israel.”
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that his country was not involved in the attack on Haniyeh.
Netanyahu, who had just returned from Washington, where he addressed Congress about the Iranian threat, told the Israeli public on Wednesday night that the Jewish state was fighting an existential war against Iran and its proxy groups.
“Since the beginning of the war, I have made it clear that we are in a fight against Iran’s axis of evil. This is an existential war against a stranglehold of terrorist armies and missiles that Iran would like to tighten around our neck,” he said.
“In my address to Congress several days ago, I noted that the three main arms of this axis of evil are Hamas, the Houthis and Hezbollah, the three H’s. We have recently struck crushing blows on each one,” he said.
Israel has been battling all three since the Hamas-led invasion of the Jewish state on October 7.
He focused on the killing earlier this month of the head of Hamas’s Al-Qassam brigade, Mohammed Deif, and the IDF attack on the Houthis. Netanyahu also referenced the killing of Shukr in Beirut on Tuesday.
“We closed an account with [Shukr], and we will close an account with anyone who harms us. Anyone who kills our children, anyone who murders our citizens, anyone who harms our country – there is blood on his head,” Netanyahu stated.
He gave an impassioned speech in favor of his policy, insisting that the war in Gaza must not end until Hamas is totally defeated.
“Already in the first days of the war, I said that the war would take time and that it would require patience from all of us. I repeat this even today.
“For months, there hasn’t been a week that we haven’t been told from home and abroad to end the war,” he said.
Opponents of his military policies have said, “End the war,” saying Israel achieved anything it can, and, in general, “it is impossible to win.”
“I didn’t give in to those voices then, and I won’t give in to them today either,” he said. “If we had given in to these pressures, we would not have eliminated senior Hamas officials and thousands of terrorists. We would not have destroyed terrorist infrastructure and Hamas’s extensive underground infrastructure. It would have simply remained with them.”
The IDF would not have seized control of the Philadelphi Corridor, which is a critical buffer zone between Gaza and Egypt through which Hamas smuggled weapons into the enclave, the prime minister said. Nor would the IDF have seized control of the Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza, he added.
Those were “Hamas’s oxygen pipe that allows them to arm themselves and rehabilitate,” Netanyahu said.
He also reiterated his stance that military pressure had helped make it more possible to achieve a hostage deal with Hamas to free the remaining 115 captives.
Netanyahu stated that these policies would help guarantee the achievement of all the war’s objectives.