Gallant said to slam Smotrich for attacks on IDF chief: ‘You are harming security’
Defense minister reportedly responds to finance minister’s attempts to thwart Halevi from making senior IDF appointments; FM Katz: ‘The cabinet is not intervening’
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant hit back at Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich over his attempts to thwart the IDF chief from making a series of senior military appointments, accusing Smotrich of harming national security, according to leaks from a late-night cabinet meeting.
According to reports, Smotrich echoed the comments he made publicly Sunday evening in a meeting of the security cabinet later that night, saying that IDF chief Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi had failed in his role and should not be the one to appoint a round of commanders.
In identical comments picked up by multiple Hebrew media outlets, indicating a coordinated leak, Gallant responded to Smotrich at the meeting, saying: “If you’re going to bring this up, bring up the full reality — how the IDF, which did fail, recovered… and is performing excellently.”
“The IDF is attaining achievements we are incredibly proud of,” Gallant reportedly continued in his comments to Smotrich. “You are harming the security of Israel and undermining the security system for political reasons only. This is alarming at any time, but especially during war. I won’t allow anyone to turn the IDF into a militia serving any one official.”
In response, Smotrich tweeted Monday morning that the real harm to national security stems from the “rejection in advance of any criticism and the unwillingness to hold a substantive discussion on issues critical to Israeli security.” He added that “silencing real debate and maintaining a chorus of only one voice through shaming and defamation” is a return to the prewar notions of October 6, “which is exactly how dangerous conceptions grow.”
In comments during a visit to a pre-army academy on Monday, President Isaac Herzog offered implicit backing to Gallant and Halevi, saying that “I trust the IDF and its commanders, from the last of its soldiers to the IDF chief of staff. We believe in all our hearts that those commanders and fighters” who have been on the front lines for more than five months “make considered, responsible and professional decisions,” he said.
In interviews on both Channel 12 news and the Kan public broadcaster Sunday evening, Smotrich directly attacked Halevi and said that he should not be able to carry out senior appointments in the military, and that the cabinet should intervene.
“This IDF chief of staff brought us one of the greatest disasters in the history of the country,” Smotrich told Channel 12. “It isn’t just that he failed on October 7, it is a long-standing failure.” Smotrich said Halevi should not be the one to “mold the next generation of the IDF.”
“He will not appoint commanders… there is no trust in this matter,” said the far-right head of the Religious Zionism party, part of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s hardline coalition.
Foreign Minister Israel Katz, of Netanyahu’s Likud party, told Army Radio on Monday morning that the issue “came up in the cabinet, and the message was clearly sent that the cabinet is not getting involved in appointments in the IDF; this authority is given to the chief of staff.”
Katz added that the people of Israel have faith in the IDF and its decision makers. “The law is clear, and the cabinet has no authority to intervene in this issue,” he said.
Responding to a question on the matter on Sunday, Halevi told reporters that decisions on such appointments “are made at the table of the chief of staff.”
“As the commander of the IDF I have full authority and responsibility to send people to the battlefield, and also to appoint people,” Halevi said, noting that commanders who had been wounded or who had left the battlefield needed to be replaced. Halevi said that halting such appointments “will harm the ability of the IDF to fight during a time of war.”
Earlier this month, Halevi announced the first list of senior appointments in the military since the October 7 onslaught, including three new brigadier generals and 11 new colonels, as well as 26 colonels who are moving positions but staying at the same rank.
Smotrich’s criticism came after the IDF announced that Brig. Gen. Barak Hiram, the commander of the Israeli military’s 99th Division, was formally censured for the demolition of a university in the Gaza Strip earlier this year without authorization.
In his comments on Sunday, Halevi said that “a commander cannot override an order without authorization if there is no operational, clear and urgent need or reason for this,” adding that “commanders who violated the rules will be investigated and dealt with as soon as possible. This is our duty.”
Smotrich’s remarks drew ire Sunday, with National Unity MK Matan Kahana saying: “A senior minister in the worst and most terrible government we’ve ever seen, the government that is responsible for the most terrible tragedy that has befallen the Jewish people since the Holocaust, does not even begin to understand the meaning of ‘responsibility.'”
Opposition Leader Yair Lapid called for the finance minister’s resignation. “First, accept responsibility for your failure as a government and resign. Only then will you have the right to talk about others,” Lapid wrote on X.
