Disputing Bar’s claims, Netanyahu cites pre-Oct. 7 Shin Bet report on Gaza calm, vows to revive comptroller probe

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continues to challenge former Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar’s defamation lawsuit over the premier’s allegations that Bar failed to warn him of the impending October 7, 2023, Hamas attack, during a rare Hebrew-language interview with the Kan public broadcaster.

Netanyahu claims he submitted nearly 1,000 documents to the State Comptroller’s Office rebutting Bar’s allegations, and accuses Bar of refusing to cooperate with the comptroller’s investigation.

“I submitted nearly 1,000 documents to the state comptroller that refute this from beginning to end. All his claims,” Netanyahu tells interviewer Ayala Hasson. “He didn’t want to cooperate with the state comptroller, and indeed, he did not cooperate with him.”

The premier cites what he describes as an October 3 Shin Bet intelligence report suggesting Hamas wanted continued stability, reading out loud what he presents as a written intelligence assessment issued just four days before the massacre, suggesting that an economic arrangement with Hamas could keep the calm in Gaza for an extended period.

Addressing Bar’s claims that he had issued strategic warnings of war leading up to the attack, Netanyahu acknowledges that security officials warned of a possible escalation amid the judicial overhaul crisis, but insists that they excluded Gaza from their assessments.

“But they always excluded one arena: Gaza. Gaza was outside the picture,” he says.

Netanyahu also accuses the High Court of Justice of halting the state comptroller’s investigations into the failures surrounding October 7 shortly after he submitted documents that he claims contradicted the security chiefs’ accounts.

“The moment I brought those documents, which refute not only these lies but other lies as well, they stopped it,” he says, vowing to revive the comptroller’s investigation if reelected later this month.

In a June ruling, the High Court found that State Comptroller Matanyahu Englman had exceeded his authority in investigating several aspects of the October 7 failures, including how intelligence and government officials handled warnings of a possible Hamas attack. The court also ordered several other probes redone due to procedural shortcomings.