Jan. 21 (UPI) — Isreal Defense Forces Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi resigned on Tuesday as he blamed himself for failures in Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack.
Halevi said his resignation will be effective March 6, according to a letter he sent to Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz. IDF Maj. Gen. Yaron Finkelman, the commanding officer of Israel’s Southern Command, also turned in his resignation, over the failures of Oct. 7, but did not give a date on when he will leave the position.
Halevi’s resignation would take place as the first stage of a cease-fire deal with Hamas had ended. Halevi had said in the past on several occasions that he planned to take responsibility for military failings that allowed Hamas to successfully attack Israel and take hostages 13 months ago.
“On the morning of Oct. 7, under my command, the IDF failed in its mission to protect the citizens of Israel,” Halevi said in his letter, according to CNN. “The State of Israel paid a heavy and painful price in lives lost, in those taken hostage, in the wounded — both physically and mentally.”
Halevi said he also had been mounting pressure from far-right conservative members of Netanyahu’s governing coalition who saw him as unwilling to go further in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank than they would like.
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