“If you do, you will live. If you don’t, Israel will hunt you down.” This stark, life-or-death ultimatum to Hamas leaders was one of the sharpest moments of Benjamin Netanyahu’s UN speech, its chilling promise echoing through the largely empty General Assembly hall.
The threat was directed at an enemy hundreds of miles away, but it was performed on a global stage. It was a demonstration of Israel’s military resolve and a message that, despite diplomatic isolation, its hunt for those responsible for the October 7 attacks would be relentless. The demand was coupled with a plea to “Free the hostages. All of them. The whole 48.”
The setting made the moment all the more surreal. A message of such raw power was delivered not to a full assembly of world leaders, but to a smattering of junior diplomats and empty chairs, the result of a mass walkout in protest of the very war from which this threat emerged.
The ultimatum serves as a grim summary of Netanyahu’s policy: a focus on military solutions and targeted killings, even as the diplomatic and political framework for a lasting peace crumbles around him. It was a message of war, delivered in the world’s highest forum for peace.