Amid the US, UK, and many other countries backing Israel in its ongoing war against Hamas militants, nearly 80 percent of Israelis blame Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for failing to prevent the Palestinian group’s Oct. 7 attack.
A poll in the Ma’ariv newspaper on Friday showed Israelis are unhappy with their prime minister, even as the chief of the general staff, the head of military intelligence, and the head of the Shin Bet intelligence service all admitted their services had failed to prevent it. attack.
A survey commissioned by the Israeli newspaper Maariv and conducted by the Lazarus Institute on October 18-19 revealed that only 8 percent of respondents did not attribute responsibility for attacks in Israeli territories near the Gaza Strip to Netanyahu.
Netanyahu’s coalition partner, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, also admitted that the government and security leadership had failed to protect the country. However, the prime minister did not comment on taking responsibility for preventing the attack.
Even within the ranks of Netanyahu’s ruling Likud party, a substantial 69 percent of voters said they believed he should take responsibility.
The poll showed a significant lead for former defense minister Benny Gantz, the leader of the centrist opposition party who recently entered a unity government. According to the results, 48 percent of those polled believed that Gantz would be a more capable prime minister, while only 28 percent thought the same about Netanyahu.
The poll was conducted Oct. 18 and 19 among 510 respondents and had a 4.3 percent margin of error, Ma’ariv said.
Hamas, whose formal name is the Islamic Resistance Movement, fired thousands of rockets at Israel on October 7 in an operation dubbed “Al-Aqsa Storm.”
Israeli attacks on Gaza claimed the tragic loss of at least 3,785 Palestinian lives, while the number in Israel exceeded 1,400.
Image Source: Oneindia
