From the Liveblog of
Saturday, May 3, 2025
Ex-PM Barak: Netanyahu has declared war on Israel, should be recused; Likud: Won’t take moral sermons from pedophile’s friend
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on GoogleSam Sokol is a former political correspondent at The Times of Israel. He was previously a reporter for the Jerusalem Post, Jewish Telegraphic Agency and Haaretz. He is the author of "Putin’s Hybrid War and the Jews"
Speaking with Israel’s Channel 13, former premier Ehud Barak calls for mass “civil disobedience” to topple Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“The State of Israel is not Netanyahu,” Barak insists, accusing the prime minister of having “declared war on Israel” and calling on Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara to submit a demand that Netanyahu recuse himself from office.
Last January, the High Court ordered that the implementation of a bill meant to shield Netanyahu from being ordered to recuse himself from office be delayed until the beginning of the next government.
In response, Netanyahu’s Likud party says it “will not accept moral sermons from someone busy tearing apart Israeli society and met more than 30 times with his pedophile friend Jeffrey Epstein, even after he was convicted of soliciting a minor for prostitution.
According to a May 2023 Wall Street Journal report, Barak met with the late disgraced former financier dozens of times between 2013 and 2017.
Their previously reported ties became an unexpected hot-button issue in the 2019 election campaign in Israel, after Epstein was arrested and later died in prison of an apparent suicide. At the time, the 66-year-old Epstein was awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges following a Miami Herald investigation that uncovered his network of sexual abuse and high-profile connections.
The Times of Israel Community.