Bennett hits back in ongoing tiff with PM

Shooting off the latest volley in a war of words with Netanyahu, Education Minister Naftali Bennett accuses the prime minister of making an ad hominem attack on him in a thinly veiled statement.

“The greatness of any system is in its ability to renew and test its basic axioms,” he says, defending remarks a day earlier in which he seemed to criticize Netanyahu and Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon for resting on outdated assumptions. “The security of Israeli citizens depends on it and thus it’s important to have a broad discussion, deep and to the point of the body of the issue and not to the body of the person.”

Earlier in the day, sources close to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu slammed Bennett for his stinging rebuke of the government’s strategy in the face of terror attacks and threats from outside Israel’s borders.

“It seems there are those who still don’t understand the difference between being a minister in the cabinet and an internet commenter in the opposition,” an official quipped.

“While the IDF, police and Shin Bet are battling terror every day and in every place, cabinet members are expected to take responsibility and contribute to the shared effort — instead of begging for votes by floating slogans and populistic attacks against a government they themselves sit in,” the source added.