TEL AVIV (Dispatches) -- 
Israel’s military chief Herzl Halevi on Tuesday resigned, citing failures in relation to Hamas’ surprise operation on southern occupied territories on October 7, 2023. His resignation will take effect on March 6. 
“The responsibility for this terrible failure stays with me every day, every hour, and will remain with me for the rest of my life,” Halevi wrote in his resignation letter to war minister Israel Katz.
Halevi is the most senior Zionist figure to resign over the fiasco when thousands of Hamas-led fighters carried out a land, sea and air assault into southern Israeli occupied territories, overtaking army bases for hours.
The Israeli opposition leader, Yair Lapid, called on the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and his cabinet also to resign.
“Now, it is time for them to take responsibility and resign – the prime minister and his entire catastrophic regime,” he said.
Halevi will formally step down in March as the first stage of Israel’s ceasefire deal with Hamas in Gaza comes to an end.
He had been widely expected to resign. It was not immediately clear who would replace him.
Senior Israeli political figures, including Netanyahu, have resisted the establishment of a state commission of inquiry despite polling that suggests an overwhelming majority of settlers back such a move.
Maj Gen Yaron Finkelman, the head of Israel’s southern command, which oversees genocide in Gaza, also tendered his resignation on Tuesday.
Israeli political analysts have long suggested that Netanyahu planned to blame Halevi for the failures of October 7. It is unclear whether Halevi will now back calls for an inquiry.
In a statement shared with media, Halevi said the failures of October 7 would stay with him for the rest of his life. 
Israel, he said, “paid a heavy and painful price” in lives lost, in captives taken, calling it a “great disaster”.
“My responsibility for this terrible failure accompanies me every day, every hour and will remain with me for the rest of my life.”
Underlining Halevi’s unpopularity, Itamar Ben-Gvir, the extremist leader of Jewish Power, who quit as security minister over the ceasefire deal, welcomed Halevi’s resignation.
About 1,200 Zionists were killed in the operation and 250 were captured. More than 90 of those taken captive are still in Gaza, about a third of whom are believed to be dead.
Halevi was seen as being in broad agreement with the former war minister Yoav Gallant, whom Netanyahu fired in November, but he appeared to be at odds with Gallant’s replacement, Israel Katz, over the direction of the war.
The far-right finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, who has threatened to bring down Netanyahu’s cabinet over the ceasefire deal, suggested on Monday that the military needed a new chief of staff.  
“We need to occupy the strip and establish a military government there. I want a chief of staff who understands that this is his goal, stands behind it and is going to realize it,” he said.
A Palestinian civilian was killed on Tuesday by Israeli forces in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, despite a ceasefire agreement having come into effect on Sunday. 
Wafa news agency reported that Salem Abu Shabeika was shot dead in Tel al-Sultan refugee camp, west of Rafah city.
On Monday, Israeli gunfire killed two Palestinian children and injured several others in Rafah.
The ceasefire agreement, which took effect on Sunday, is designed to last for 42 days 
and be implemented in three stages. 
Hamas released three Israeli women in exchange for 90 Palestinian prisoners, mostly women and children.
There was an element of theater in the handover, when dozens of masked Hamas fighters wearing green headbands and military fatigues paraded in front of cameras and held back a crowd of hundreds who surrounded the vehicles.
For all the military might Israel deployed in Gaza, it failed to remove Hamas from power, one of its central war aims. That could make a return to fighting more likely, but the results might be the same.
The resistance group has not only survived 15 months of war with Israel — among the deadliest and most destructive in recent memory — but it remains firmly in control of the coastal territory that now resembles an apocalyptic wasteland. 
With a surge of humanitarian aid promised as part of the ceasefire deal, the Hamas-run government said Monday that it will coordinate distribution to the desperate people of Gaza.
The scenes elsewhere in Gaza were even more remarkable: Thousands of Hamas-run police in uniform re-emerged, making their presence known even in the most heavily destroyed areas.
“The police have been here the whole time, but they were not wearing their uniforms” to avoid being targeted by Israel, said Muhammad Abed, a father of three who returned to his home in Gaza City more than seven months after fleeing the area.
“They were among the displaced people in the tents. That’s why there were no thefts,” he said.
Other residents said the police had maintained offices in hospitals and other locations throughout the war, where people could report crimes.
Earlier this month, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a prepared speech that Hamas had recruited nearly as many fighters as it lost during the war.
Michael Milshtein, an Israeli expert on Palestinian affairs and former military intelligence officer, said Hamas has returned to its insurgent roots, using creative tactics like harvesting unexploded Israeli ordnance for homemade bombs. 
“The war is ending with a strong perception of success for Hamas,” he added. 
Avi Issacharoff, a veteran Israeli journalist — and co-creator of the Netflix hit “Fauda” — said Netanyahu’s refusal to plan for the day after was the “biggest debacle of this war.”
“Israel is waking up from a nightmare into the very same nightmare,” he wrote in Yediot Ahronot newspaper. “Hamas is going to remain in power and will continue to build more tunnels and recruit more men.”