Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu named retired Major General Eyal Zamir as Israel’s new armed forces chief Saturday after his predecessor resigned last month taking responsibility for failing to stop Hamas’s October 2023 attack.
“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz have agreed this evening on the appointment of Major General (Res.) Eyal Zamir as the next chief of staff of the (Israeli military),” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement. Zamir replaces Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi, who resigned on January 21, two days after a fragile ceasefire took effect in Gaza which has now seen the release of 18 hostages by Hamas and its ally Islamic Jihad.
Zamir, 59, has been serving as defense ministry director general since 2023 and, according to Israeli media, he retired from the military after losing out on the top job to Halevi.
Zamir had served as the deputy chief of staff until 2021 and prior to that was head of the army’s Southern Command, which is responsible for Gaza.
As head of Southern Command, Zamir led efforts to “thwart offensive terror tunnels penetrating from the Gaza Strip into Israeli territory,” according to the defense ministry.
Halevi said in his resignation letter that he was stepping down “due to my acknowledgement of responsibility for the (military’s) failure on October 7, (2023)”, but added that he was leaving at a time of “significant successes.”
Shortly after Halevi’s announcement, the wartime head of Southern Command, Major General Yaron Finkelman, too resigned over the military’s failings in 2023.
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