After leaving the meeting at the Prime Minister's office between the representatives of the Tikva Forum and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Itzik Bonzel, father of Amit Bonzel, who fell in battle in the Gaza Strip, relates the conversation in which the Prime Minister expressed a determined and resolute position in his quest to overthrow and collapse Hamas.
"We voiced our demands to the Prime Minister to end this war only in victory, without any kind of ceasefire, that would end the war already now. We reminded the Prime Minister of his commitment regarding the defeat of Hamas and the return of the hostages," Bonzel says and added that the Prime Minister made it clear that the goals of the war have not changed and he is still committed to them.
"He promised that he is committed to enter Rafah. He said that currently close to two hundred thousand residents have left Rafah and many more are about to leave Rafah in the coming hours and days," Bonzel says and adds that "Netanyahu has made it clear to us that without the deployment of these four battalions in Rafah, this war will not end. He also made it clear that without overthrowing Hamas rule in Gaza, this war will not end. They are currently working to achieve the best results regarding the hostages."
"Families of the hostages from the Tikva Forum who participated in the meeting made it clear to Netanyahu that they have one demand, and that is that there will be no selection made between the hostages, but that the deal will include all the hostages in one stage," Bonzel says. Regarding the updates that 20-30 hostages will be released initially, Bonzel says that this is a condition that Hamas proposed, but the Israeli government cannot accept, or agree to this, “So, we are not talking about 20 or 30 hostages, and we understood that the mission is to bring all the hostages home at once.”
"We expressed our support for the Prime Minister after hearing the reports about the Hague Tribunal. The Prime Minister banged on the table and said, “I am ready to sacrifice everything for the people of Israel and the State of Israel. I am not afraid of these orders, and I am ready to pay a personal price for the country and my people. I will pay the price. It seems that the Prime Minister is not acting under the threat of the orders against him, and it certainly strengthened us when we saw a determined leader who has not changed the goals of the war since the war began.”
Regarding the possibility that Netanyahu will choose to postpone the IDF’s entry into Rafah in order to enable a hostage deal, Itzik Bonzel says, "Naturally, the Prime Minister did not give us any dates and times, but when I hear a Prime Minister who has summoned us for a meeting and has committed and repeated his commitment, giving examples from the past, when it was said that after a ceasefire they would not return to fighting, and the fighting resumed anyway, he has pledged that the fighting would continue and he stood by it."
"I met a determined prime minister, a prime minister who knows that details will also leave his office. We were not told not to say things or to censor information. These are the things that the Prime Minister said to citizens like me, a bereaved father, and he is doing everything he can so that my son's death will not be in vain. After the hour and a half meeting with a determined man, and I would even say a dynamic man, a man with strength that I don't know how he withstands all these pressures and a vast amount of working hours, while he still remains bright and clear. I'm not a member of the Likud party, I'm just a bereaved father, who has found himself in this difficult and bitter situation, and all I'm doing now is trying to complete my son’s mission. My son went to battle in Gaza to return the hostages and make sure that these military events, that have been frequent in recent years, come to an end, so that the south, and certainly also the north, will live in security. This is my mission. My son did not complete it and fell in battle, but I have been recruited for the same goal."
Bonzel clarifies that as a grieving, bereaved father, he cannot say that he has come out of the meeting fully satisfied and encouraged, or even as a worried citizen. Even so, he said, "I hope that after the Prime Minister looked into the eyes of the bereaved parents and the parents of the hostages and answered each and every question in the clearest and most open way, I believe that he is compelled to uphold his promises and I pray for the safe return of all the hostages to their homes, even at the cost of a rescue operation that we know how to implement. We have a strong army and soldiers imbued with a mission and we have to trust the army that it knows what needs to be done in order to free the hostages."