Israel’s Gaza operation and the Messianic right When politics trumps public opinion

A recent Foreign Policy article pulls back the curtain on the complex forces driving Israel’s latest offensive in Gaza, revealing a stark contrast between public sentiment and political strategy. While polls suggest that most Israelis are exhausted by nearly two years of conflict and favour a negotiated deal with Hamas, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is pressing ahead with an operation that many see as unnecessary, dangerous, and politically motivated.

According to the piece, a broad majority of Israelis—including 68 percent of Jewish citizens—support a cease-fire and a deal to exchange hostages for peace. Many prefer Gaza to be handed over to the Palestinian Authority or a technocratic Palestinian administration once the fighting ends. Yet, a minority of Israeli Jews is increasingly open to more extreme measures, including settlement expansion and de facto Israeli control of Gaza. Polls by the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) show that support for settlements in Gaza among Israeli Jews has risen from 22 percent in December to 28.5 percent in May, while the Israel Democracy Institute found 40 percent backing settlement initiatives.

Numbers alone, however, fail to capture the political leverage wielded by Israel’s far-right. Messianic parties like Religious Zionism and Otzma Yehudit hold a disproportionately powerful position in government despite capturing just over 10 percent of the vote in 2022. Their ability to threaten coalition collapse grants them outsized influence over Netanyahu, who faces the real possibility of losing the next election if these parties withdraw support. The result is a government increasingly shaped by a fringe ideology: annexation, settlement expansion, and the eventual displacement of Palestinians from Gaza.

The article highlights how far-right figures such as Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir exploit their governmental roles to tighten Israeli control in the West Bank and allow extremist settlers to act with near impunity. Meanwhile, ordinary Israelis often interpret far-right policies through a national security lens, making annexation and settlement expansion seem like legitimate responses to Hamas’ October 2023 attacks. The ideological underpinning—fulfilling biblical commandments and securing “ancestral” land—remains largely hidden behind the language of defense and deterrence.

Foreign Policy also examines the controversial “Gaza Riviera” blueprint reportedly backed by the White House, which envisages reconstructing Gaza into a high-tech tourism hub. While Palestinians would theoretically retain property rights, the plan implicitly facilitates depopulation and increased Israeli security control, aligning with the far-right vision of expulsion and settlement. In practice, the ongoing Gaza City operation risks creating a vast humanitarian disaster, leaving Palestinians few options but to flee and entrenching Israel in a prolonged occupation.

The article underscores a critical tension: Israel’s military and the broader public largely want an end to the conflict, but the far-right agenda—amplified by political necessity for Netanyahu—drives the country toward escalation. Soldiers, exhausted and morally ambivalent, are executing operations that serve an ideological project they may not endorse. Netanyahu’s determination to retain power, rather than achieve strategic or humanitarian goals, ensures that politics, not public opinion or military necessity, is dictating Israel’s next moves in Gaza.

By Vugar Khalilov