In clash with Zamir, Katz orders re-evaluation of external probe of IDF’s Oct.7 investigations

Defense Minister Israel Katz continues to clash with IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir, saying that he has ordered the defense establishment comptroller to re-evaluate the findings made by an external panel of former senior officers that looked into the IDF’s October 7 investigations.

Katz also says he is freezing senior appointments in the IDF until Defense Establishment Comptroller Brig. Gen. (res.) Yair Volansky submits his findings.

Volansky is to “thoroughly examine the report” that was put together by Maj. Gen. (res.) Sami Turgeman and a team of other former senior officers, “including the question of the need for additional investigations in areas that the IDF has not previously investigated… as well as completing investigations that the committee marked in red and determined were not carried out properly and in depth,” Katz says in a statement.

Turgeman’s team noted several topics that were not investigated at all, chief among them was the IDF’s handling of intelligence reports received since 2018, which outlined Hamas’s intent to launch a wide-scale attack against Israel, known as “Jericho’s Walls.”

Additionally, Katz says the comptroller will be asked to “formulate a recommendation for equal criteria regarding the drawing of personal conclusions,” after Zamir last night announced he was dismissing and censuring a host of officers involved in the October 7 failures, based on Turgeman’s findings.

Katz says that Volansky will submit his recommendations within 30 days, “so that I can quickly form my position on senior IDF appointments under my authority in light of the events of October 7.”

Additionally, Katz says that his position, whereby officers who served in the Southern Command on October 7 will not be promoted, “remains unchanged.” This comes after Zamir ruled that there was no issue with the promotion of three senior officers, whose promotions were previously held up or canceled by Katz.

Katz also claims that the issue of appointing a military attaché to the US “is entirely unrelated to this matter and does not constitute grounds for delaying any appointment in the IDF.” Katz has been seeking to appoint his military secretary, Brig. Gen. Guy Markizeno, as the next attaché, a move that Zamir does not support.