Hundreds of former top Israeli officials appeal to Trump to end Gaza genocide
Hundreds of former top Israeli officials appeal to Trump to end Gaza genocide
M.U.H
04/08/202568
Hundreds of former top Israeli officials, including ex-chiefs of spy agencies, have urged US President Donald Trump to push the regime to halt the Gaza genocide.
“It is our professional judgment that Hamas no longer poses a strategic threat to Israel,” the former officials wrote in an open letter shared with the media on Monday.
“At first this war was a just war, a defensive war, but when we achieved all military objectives, this war ceased to be a just war,” Ami Ayalon, former director of the Shin Bet security service, claimed.
The war, nearing its 23rd month, “is leading [Israel] to lose its security and identity,” Ayalon warned in a video released to accompany the letter.
The letter, signed by 550 individuals, including ex-leaders of Shin Bet and the Mossad, urged Trump to “steer” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu toward a ceasefire.
The letter was signed by three former Mossad heads: Tamir Pardo, Efraim Halevy, and Danny Yatom.
Others signatories include five former heads of Shin Bet -- Αyalon as well as Nadav Argaman, Yoram Cohen, Yaakov Peri, and Carmi Gilon -- and three former military chiefs of staff, including former prime minister Ehud Barak, former minister of military affairs Moshe Yaalon, and Dan Halutz.
The letter also claimed that the Israeli military “has long accomplished the two objectives that could be achieved by force: dismantling Hamas’s military formations and governance.”
“The third, and most important, can only be achieved through a deal: bringing all the [captives] home,” it added.
This comes as some in Israel, including ministers in Netanyahu’s cabinet, are advocating for military escalation and partial or complete occupation of Gaza instead.
Israel has faced growing global pressure in recent weeks to accept a ceasefire, which would facilitate the release of its captives in Gaza and allow UN agencies to deliver humanitarian aid.
After a ceasefire, the signatories claimed, Trump could force a regional coalition to support a reformed Palestinian Authority to take charge of Gaza.
The Israeli regime has maintained a blockade on Gaza for 18 years and, since March 2, 2025, has sealed all border crossings, blocking the entry of all aid and worsening the already dire humanitarian conditions in the territory.
The Palestinian people in Gaza are in dire need of food as the Israeli blockade on aid continues.
Officials from the UN and humanitarian agencies report that this blockade and the associated restrictions on humanitarian aid deliveries have led to widespread starvation among Palestinians.
Since the Israeli regime began its genocidal war on Gaza on October 7, 2023, it has murdered over 60,839 people and wounded 149,588, most of them children and women.
At least 175 people, including 93 children, have died of hunger and malnutrition across Gaza due to the Israeli-imposed starvation since the onset of the war, according to the health ministry.
