Bereaved families blast PM’s apology as ‘too little, too late’
Parents of fallen soldiers ask why Netanyahu waited 5 days to denounce Likud MKs who shouted at them during Knesset hearing on 2014 Gaza war
Judah Ari Gross is The Times of Israel's religions and Diaspora affairs correspondent.
A group of parents whose sons were killed in the 2014 Gaza war fired off a harsh letter to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday, condemning what they called his “too little and too late” apology over the conduct of two Likud Knesset members who yelled at bereaved families during a heated Knesset committee meeting last week.
“You were present at the meeting and sat silently as members of Knesset from your party yelled at and insulted bereaved families,” the parents said in the letter.
“Would the Knesset members have dared to act this way if they hadn’t known they were permitted to do so?” they asked.
Netanyahu was invited to the Knesset State Control Committee hearing to answer questions on a state comptroller report, published in February, that found serious failures by the military and government ahead of and during the 50-day conflict known in Israel as Operation Protective Edge.
In the 2014 war, 68 IDF soldiers were killed, along with six civilians in Israel. The missive was sent by a group of approximately 45 of their families, according to Avi Yaakovi, whose son died in the war and acts as something of a spokesperson for the group.
“Do you think their conduct served the purpose of the discussion? Was the goal of quarreling with us the derailment of the discussion of the report?” the letter read.
On Sunday, Netanyahu discussed last Wednesday’s Knesset committee meeting, during which MKs David Bitan and Miki Zohar argued with the parents of fallen soldiers.
“I would like to say a few words to the bereaved families,” Netanyahu said at the opening of his weekly cabinet meeting. “The entire people of Israel is united around you, who have lost what is dearer than anything on behalf of the security of Israel.”
Referring to the death of his brother Yoni Netanyahu, the sole Israeli soldier killed during the 1976 Entebbe raid, the prime minister said he understood the “deep pain” the families feel for their loved ones.
“As prime minister and the son of a bereaved family, I heard what was said last week in the Knesset in the heat of debate,” he said. “I regret that these remarks were made; an immediate apology was necessary and it is good that this was done.”
During the meeting, Ilan Sagi — whose son Erez was killed when terrorists emerged from a tunnel and attacked his pillbox near Nahal Oz — accused Bitan of mistreating him during an earlier encounter.
He described standing outside the Prime Minister’s Office holding a sign asking for an inquiry into the failures of the Gaza war. “This big wise guy comes along, the one who talks the most [Bitan], and he tells me, ‘Go, this won’t help. You said that!’” Sagi claimed, looking at Bitan.
“You are a liar! I have never spoken with you!” Bitan, who serves as coalition chairman, shouted back at him in the middle of the meeting. “Stop exploiting this to lie here!”
In another tense moment, Leah Goldin, whose son Hadar’s remains are being held by Hamas along with those of fellow soldier Oron Shaul, charged that Netanyahu had turned the bereaved families into “enemies of the people… You have turned the problem of returning the boys into a problem of the families,” she said.
Zohar retorted that her claims were “exaggerated.”
“Don’t answer me. Such insolence!” cried Goldin, throwing a plastic cup in his direction. “I don’t even know your name.”
The two MKs offered apologies to the families following the incident.
While several Likud MKs slammed their colleagues for the outbursts, until Sunday Netanyahu refrained from commenting publicly. He did, however, personally rebuke Zohar and Bitan, telling them that they had behaved in a “disgraceful” manner, Channel 2 news reported Thursday.
The bereaved families called Sunday’s apology a “feeble statement to the press” and noted that Netanyahu’s remarks came five days after the incident.
“Was there a need for five days of consideration for you to understand what everyone understood then and there?” the parents asked.
In the letter, the parents told Netanyahu he should have stopped “the perverse behavior” of Bitan and Zohar, who were “hurling insults at the parents of soldiers who fell during a military campaign that you led.”
According to the bereaved families, a “red line was crossed” at the meeting and the prime minister’s “long silence” on the issue “created a fracture that it will be difficult to heal.”
They added: “Unfortunately, your apology is too little and too late.”
The parents who signed the letter lamented that the discussion in the Knesset committee hearing went off the rails, preventing serious discussions on the failures of the government and military to prepare for and wage Operation Protective Edge.
They urged Netanyahu to implement the recommendations made by the state comptroller in the report, mostly those dealing with improvements to the security cabinet’s management.
“We expect that the bereaved families and the general public will be notified of the implementation of the recommendations and adjustments that have already been put into place and those that are expected to be carried out,” the parents said.
“That is how a responsible prime minister, looking out for the good of the country, would act.”
The Prime Minister’s Office did not respond to The Times of Israel’s request for comment.
Raoul Wootliff contributed to this report.
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