Israeli top security officials verbally attacked each other this Friday over Israel’s still-continuing war in Gaza.
As the war in Gaza still continues after over 10 months, tensions between Israeli top security officials have also increased to unprecedented levels in recent days.
This Friday, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant rebuked the angry departure of National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir from a meeting of the Israeli Security and Political Affairs Cabinet on the same day, saying that Ben Gvir is behaving “irresponsibly” and is “a threat to Israel’s national security.”
“In the face of the irresponsible actions of Minister Ben Gvir, which endangers Israel’s national security and creates internal divisions in the country, the head of the Shin Bet and his people are just doing their duty and their duty to warn about the serious consequences of these actions,” Gallant wrote on X.
In response to Gallant, Ben Gvir also took on the popular social media platform and wrote: “You promised to return Lebanon to the Stone Age, while you return northern Israel to the Stone Age. Instead of attacking me in X, [Gallant] should attack Lebanon’s Hezbollah.”
Friday’s meeting came after Ben Gvir called for the resignation of Ronan Barr, the head of the domestic Israeli intelligence agency Shin Bet, who criticized his recent provocative visit to Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied Jerusalem and his broader support for settler violence against Palestinians.
It’s all Ben Gvir’s fault!
On August 13, Ben Gvir and hundreds of settlers, backed by the Israeli police, stormed Al-Aqsa Mosque. A few days later, some 70 armed Israeli settlers carried out an unauthorized attack against Palestinians in the West Bank town of Jit, killing one Palestinian.
In reaction to the two incidents, Ronen Bar issued a letter to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, warning that attacks by Jewish settlers and Ben Gvir’s provocative visit to Al-Aqsa Mosque compound are causing “indescribable damage” to Israel.
The letter, first reported by Channel 12 News this past Thursday, expressed Bar’s deep concern as a security official to several key Israeli ministers. He described the radical Jewish settler gangs known as “Hilltop Youths”, which are backed by the Israeli government as a group that has “long ago become a hotbed of violence against Palestinians.”
“The loss of fear of administrative detention due to the conditions they get in prison and the money given to them upon their release, together with legitimization and praise, alongside de-legitimization of security forces, contributes to the phenomenon’s continuation,” wrote Bar, emphasizing that the solution doesn’t lie with the Shin Bet but rather requires action from the state’s leaders.
