Lapid accuses PM of trying to ‘whitewash’ own responsibility by appointing far-right ministers, architect of judicial overhaul that led to ‘neglected’ security before Hamas attack
Justice Minister Yariv Levin of the ruling Likud party will head the ministerial panel to determine the mandate of the government’s controversial commission of inquiry into failures surrounding the Hamas onslaught of October 7, 2023, Cabinet Secretary Yossi Fuchs announced Monday.
The announcement was slammed by government critics, who charge that the judicial overhaul spearheaded by Levin caused a security lapse that led to the onslaught.
In a letter to members of the government, Fuchs said the panel would also include Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, as well as Settlements and National Missions Minister Orit Strock, of Smotrich’s Religious Zionism party, and Heritage Minister Amichay Eliyahu of Ben Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit party.
Levin’s fellow Likud members Agriculture Minister Avi Dichter, Science and Technology Minister Gila Gamliel and Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli will also be on the panel, as will Minister in the Finance Ministry Ze’ev Elkin, of Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar’s New Hope party, which broke away from the Likud in 2020 before dissolving back into it.
The special ministerial panel will have 45 days to submit its recommendations to the government regarding the commission’s mandate, including the topics and timeframes that will be probed.
Aside from Elkin, all the ministers on the panel were in office during the October 7 attack, when thousands of Hamas-led terrorists stormed southern Israel to kill some 1,200 people and take 251 hostages, sparking the war in Gaza.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s critics, including the families of October 7 victims, demand that policy and intelligence failures before, during and after the onslaught be probed by a state commission of inquiry, Israel’s highest investigative authority. Opinion polls consistently show a strong majority of Israelis support a state commission of inquiry into the attack.
Netanyahu has rejected such a commission because its make-up would be determined by the judiciary, which his current government seeks to weaken through its judicial overhaul. On Sunday, the government voted to establish its own commission of inquiry with “as broad public approval as possible.”
Responding to Monday’s announcement, Opposition Leader Yair Lapid, who along with other opposition officials rejected the government probe, said the ministers “have no moral or legal authority to investigate themselves.”
He listed his grievances against specific members of the panel, beginning with its head, Levin, whose judicial overhaul Lapid said was why “security was neglected” before October 7; Eliyahu, “who offered to drop a nuclear bomb on Gaza”; Smotrich, “who announced that it was ‘justified and moral’ to starve children”; Ben Gvir, “because of whom hostages were abused”; and Strock, who called on the IDF to fight in areas where it knew there were hostages even if that would put them in danger.
“These are the minister Netanyahu has appointed to whitewash his own blame and dissemble his own responsibility for the October 7 massacre,” said Lapid. “It won’t work.”
After it was unveiled by Levin, in January 2023, the judicial overhaul triggered mass demonstrations against the proposals, which came to a halt with the Hamas onslaught. Some activists who served as reservists in the IDF threatened to stop showing up for duty should the overhaul go through. Allies of Netanyahu have seized on those threats to pin the blame for the Hamas onslaught on the anti-government movement.
During the demonstrations, Israel’s security chiefs warned privately and publicly that the judicial overhaul and resultant social discord would be exploited by Israel’s enemies.
Security chiefs had also warned against Netanyahu’s years-long policy of letting Qatar send millions of dollars in cash to Hamas on a weekly basis, which the premier — whose top aides are under investigation over their allegedly illicit ties to the country — has said was earmarked for government salaries.
As reported by The Times of Israel