How state report on Israel’s Gaza war will impact Netanyahu
The Israeli state comptroller's report on the 2014 Gaza War criticizes the decision-making process overseen by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon.
As long as the country was small and weak and surrounded by enemies, Israel was able to score decisive victories in its conflicts. The 1967 Six Day War turned Israel into a regional empire and made the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) the strongest army in the Middle East. Since then, however, Israel has not been able to end any of its wars or large operations without the post-war ritual of national commissions of inquiry, reciprocal accusations of guilt, political beheadings and lamentations.
This ritual was observed after the 1973 Yom Kippur War, the 1982 First Lebanon War, the 2006 Second Lebanon War and now on the heels of the 2014 Protective Edge campaign. The state comptroller's report by Judge Joseph Shapira concerning Operation Protective Edge will be published tomorrow afternoon, Feb. 28. Made available early to the press, it contains a large quantity of explosive, embarrassing materials, including personal comments to the most senior leaders during the campaign: from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu through Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon, Chief of Staff Gen. Benny Gantz, Military Intelligence head Maj. Gen. Aviv Kochavi and others.
But the main fight now is between Education Minister Naftali Bennett and Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Ya’alon. Destiny has decided that Ya’alon, who was fired by Netanyahu less than a year ago in favor of Avigdor Liberman, now finds himself sitting in a sinking boat with Netanyahu. One of the issues that has been expected to come up in the report is the question of whether Netanyahu and Ya’alon properly handled the threat of Hamas' tunnels and whether they informed all Cabinet ministers about it. The two will be forced to defend themselves together against Bennett, who missed no opportunity over the last two years to bring the issue up. Now, it seems, the report substantiates Bennett’s claims.
Bennett views the comptroller’s report as a welcome political springboard: He was, after all, the only one to take the tunnel threat seriously, warn the Cabinet about it and even demand that the IDF take real action against the tunnels to neutralize the threat.
