Former PMs Lapid, Olmert agree to testify before unofficial inquiry into Oct. 7 failures

By Sam Sokol 5 August 2024, 2:12 pm

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Sam 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"

Then-prime minister Ehud Olmert pauses prior to a meeting of the Foreign Affairs and Defence committee at Israel's parliament in Jerusalem, October 30, 2006. (Pierre Terdjman / Flash90)

Former prime ministers Ehud Olmert and Yair Lapid agree to testify before the so-called civil commission of inquiry probing the events leading up to the October 7 Hamas onslaught.

With Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeatedly putting off the establishment of a state commission of inquiry to investigate successive government’s failures that enabled the October 7 attack, several groups representing survivors of the Hamas massacres and the families of those killed recently announced the formation of the independent probe, which they have said is aimed at “reaching the truth and preventing the next disaster.”

The commission’s members include two retired generals, a former police commissioner and the author of the IDF’s official code of ethics.

The commission says it is still waiting on a response from Netanyahu as well as former prime ministers Naftali Bennett and Ehud Barak.