He has prosecuted the campaign from his satellite office in the military’s Tel Aviv compound, where diplomatic visitors find a hallway filled with remnants of rockets and maps marking tunnels that troops have uncovered. He has not attended funerals, though his wife has quietly paid condolence calls.

Almost always by his side are his chief of staff, national security adviser and military attaché. Besides the defense minister, the politician spending the most time with Mr. Netanyahu is Tzipi Livni, the centrist justice minister who five years ago was his chief rival. Ms. Livni, a former foreign minister, is valued by the prime minister for her experience and standing among world leaders, several people around him said.

In his office and the cabinet room, where one session stretched more than seven hours, Mr. Netanyahu has set up his beloved white boards, and occasionally sketched diagrams of possible operations. He gives even those who disagree with him ample time to air their views — “sometimes maybe too much,” said Yuval Steinitz, the minister for strategic affairs. He rarely calls for votes, so far only to embrace Egypt’s initial cease-fire proposal on July 15, start the ground operation two days later and reject Mr. Kerry’s plan on Friday night.

“I can only compliment him, unfortunately,” said Yaakov Peri, a centrist minister and previous Netanyahu critic who sits in on the sessions. “It seems the steering is in the right hand in this conflict.”

Wars often quell political division, but Mr. Peri and others were still impressed by the breadth of backing. A poll of Israeli Jews conducted for Channel 2 News on Wednesday showed more than 8 in 10 were satisfied with Mr. Netanyahu, a 25 point jump from before the ground invasion began.

Over the past week, Mr. Netanyahu met in Israel with Mr. Kerry, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon of the United Nations and the foreign ministers of Britain, France, Italy and Norway. He visited troops preparing to enter Gaza on Monday, and those hospitalized with battle wounds on Tuesday. He did satellite interviews with four American news networks and two British channels that broadcast in Arabic over two days. (His office declined a request for an interview for this article.)

He sleeps at his Jerusalem residence, but sometimes naps at the Kirya, as the military’s Tel Aviv compound is called. There, the prime minister’s office is in an old house, where Mr. Netanyahu often has a cigar at hand. (Smoking is banned in the cabinet room, where late-night sessions are fueled by espresso and soft drinks.)