Benjamin Netanyahu made his decision at the most unexpected moment, as Election Day began in the United States, the outcome of which should prove decisive for his country. On the evening of Tuesday, November 5, the Israeli prime minister announced the dismissal of his defense minister, Yoav Gallant. Gallant, who was in increasingly open opposition to Netanyahu over the conduct of the war in Gaza, as well as on other crucial issues, had come to embody a form of internal contradiction that was intolerable for the prime minister, even though the two men belong to the same party, the Likud. The decision, which immediately sparked demonstrations in several parts of Israel, brings to an end long months of tension between the two men. It comes at a time when Israel is still engaged in a war which, from Gaza to Lebanon, involves the army on several fronts, and when Iran has threatened to launch a new sequence of missile attacks against Israeli territory.

To explain his decision, the Israeli prime minister said in a statement that he and Gallant had had "significant differences on how to conduct the military campaign." "In the midst of a war, more than ever, full trust is required between the prime minister and defense minister," but, "in recent months, this trust has been eroded," Netanyahu had written, a few hours earlier, in a letter addressed to Gallant.

Tensions between the two men reached breaking point during the summer. Since the beginning of 2023, Gallant, with the support of the military hierarchy and the agreement of the heads of the intelligence services, believed that the army should put an end to ground operations in Gaza and that it was urgent to conclude an agreement with Hamas to put an end to the war and secure the release of the remaining Israeli hostages (according to the government, only 51 of the 101 are still being held in the enclave). Netanyahu, however, continued to take the opposite view, which he shared with the far-right ministers in his coalition government. These ministers threatened to leave the coalition in the event of a peace agreement in Gaza, leading to new elections, a prospect that Netanyahu refused to accept, fearing that he would lose power.

At a press conference late on Tuesday night, Gallant listed the reasons for his dispute with Netanyahu. He began by referring to the context of the war in Gaza and spoke movingly of the fate of the hostages, referring to their abandonment as a form of "mark of Cain" that would forever stain the Israeli leadership. This was a full-scale direct attack on Netanyahu's positions. He also spoke of the need to set up a commission of inquiry to establish the failings at the head of the state – civil, military, intelligence – that had enabled Hamas to carry out its October 7, 2023, attack on Israeli territory, resulting in the massacre of 1,200 people.

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