Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has dissolved his six-member War Cabinet in the latest dramatic evidence of the struggle within his own government.
The prime minister reportedly told Cabinet members that he will now hold sensitive consultations in a smaller handpicked "kitchen cabinet" in a process that will likely be less transparent than previous discussions.
The move comes just over a week after one of Netanyahu's War Cabinet ministers, popular centrist Benny Gantz, resigned in protest over how Natanyahu is waging the war against Hamas. He accused Netanyahu of putting his political survival ahead of a rationale solution to the conflict that's best for Israel.
The dissolution of the Cabinet also follows a clash between Netanyahu and the Israeli Defense Forces over providing aid to besieged Gaza civilians.
The IDF announced Sunday that military operations would be suspended daily along a road in southern Gaza to allow for increased delivery of humanitarian aid. Netanyahu was said to be angry about the "unacceptable" plan, and only agreed to it if attacks would continue unabated in Rafah.
The latest move could be a sign of a government inching toward dissolution — or a consolidation of power by Netanyahu to increasingly please his extremist supporters. The war, triggered by a Hamas assault in Israeli that killed 1,200 and kidnapped hundreds, has claimed 37,000 Palestinian lives, according to the Gaza Helath Ministry.
Netanyahu has successfully been "making political hay" with his supporters from his conflict with President Joe Biden over Biden's calls for a ceasefire and humanitarian aid for Palestinians, Paul Salem, the vice president for international engagement at the Washington-based Middle East Institute think tank, told NBC News.
He's "making out like he's standing up for what the Israelis want and refusing to succumb to pressure," Salem added. "That has helped him politically."
Meanwhile, the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court has filed applications to obtain arrest warrants against Netanyahu, his defense minister and Hamas leaders on charges of suspected war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Israeli-Hamas conflict.
