JERUSALEM: Israeli opposition politician Gadi Eisenkot, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu's main rival in upcoming elections, vowed Thursday to end Hamas rule in Gaza if he wins office following the Oct 27 vote.
"Today I give a public commitment: from the moment I enter the prime minister's office, within 18 months Hamas will no longer rule the Gaza Strip," the leader of the centre-right Yashar party said at a press conference near the war-ravaged Palestinian territory.
He said he would achieve this either by implementing US president Donald Trump's ceasefire plan, which provides for the gradual disarmament of Hamas and a transfer of power, or through "creative operations" by Israel's military aimed at destroying the Palestinian movement's military wing.
Hamas announced in July that it was disbanding its governing body to facilitate the transfer of Gaza's administration to a nascent technocratic Palestinian committee called the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza (NCAG).
The NCAG, currently based in Cairo, was created following the declaration of a ceasefire last October and is overseen by Trump's Board of Peace.
Later in July, Hamas announced it had agreed to a deal involving the handing over of its weapons to the NCAG.
However, Israel has been sceptical, with Netanyahu demanding verifiable decommissioning of all weapons before any withdrawal of the military takes place.
Hamas has not gone ahead with disarmament, Israel has refused to reciprocate by starting to withdraw forces, and the NCAG is not operating inside the territory.
Israeli forces were allowed to stay in 53% of Gaza under the terms of the ceasefire, but a year later they control about 70%, according to official accounts.
'Strategic failure'
Eisenkot's campaign pledge on Thursday is one of the strongest yet from the 66-year-old former military chief.
The close-fought election will be the first since Hamas's Oct 7, 2023 attack on Israel, which resulted in the deaths of more than 1,200 people.
In response to the attack, Israel launched a massive offensive in Gaza that has killed more than 74,300 people, according to the territory's health ministry, which operates under Hamas and whose figures are generally considered reliable by the UN.
Eisenkot on Thursday accused Netanyahu of a "strategic failure" in Gaza, where he said "Hamas is still the sovereign... armed, arming itself, and militarily active" after three years of war.
He also reiterated a pledge to establish a state commission of inquiry to identify those responsible for any security lapses leading up to Oct 7, a push the government has so far resisted.
"There is a way to prevent the next disaster," he said.
Eisenkot, like other opposition politicians, regularly accuses Netanyahu of bearing personal responsibility for the Oct 7 attack, notably by ignoring warnings from his security services and the UAE, according to media reports.
Netanyahu has categorically rejected the accusations and maintains that security officials did not wake him on the morning of the attack.
Current polls show that neither Netanyahu's bloc nor that led by Eisenkot is in a position to win the 61 seats needed to control the 120-seat parliament and form a governing coalition.