High-level meeting on post-war Gaza blows up as ministers protest IDF probe — reports

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu chairs a cabinet meeting at the Kirya military HQ in Tel Aviv on December 24, 2023. (Miriam Alster/Flash90)
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu chairs a cabinet meeting at the Kirya military HQ in Tel Aviv on December 24, 2023. (Miriam Alster/Flash90)

A meeting of the high-level security cabinet intended to discuss what Gaza will look like in the post-war period was put on ice after it descended into a shouting match as right-wing ministers attacked IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi, Hebrew language news sites report, citing sources with knowledge of the meeting.

According to the Walla news site and others, ministers attacked Halevy over the makeup of a panel formed to probe the military’s mistakes in the lead-up to the October 7 massacres, which will include Shaul Mofaz, who was defense minister from 2002 to 2006.

Once ministers Miri Regev, David Amsalem and Itamar Ben Gvir got wind of Mofaz’s involvement, they began to protest loudly to Halevi during the meeting over the fact that he had “appointed people behind the Gaza disengagement,” Walla reports.

“You appointed Mofaz? Are you crazy,” the Kan broadcaster quotes Regev saying.

According to the Kan, the trio were also perturbed by the timing of the announcement, with fighting still ongoing.

After current Defense Minister Yoav Gallant hushed the trio and came to Halevi’s defense, Ben Gvir began attacking military planners for continuing to rely on what critics describe as a failed conception of geopolitics exposed by the attacks.

This prompted war cabinet minister Benny Gantz, a former chief of staff and defense minister, to explode that “this is a professional investigation, what does it have to do with the disengagement and conceptions? The chief of staff is fucking probing what happened to serve our battle aims and our ability to plan for a confrontation in the north,” Walla reports.

As others shouted back, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ended the meeting, according to the reports.

Israel pulled out of Gaza in 2005 in a unilateral move that some on the far-right hope to see reversed following the war against Hamas in the Strip, a veritable non-starter. Regev herself is largely identified with the pull-out thanks to her role as IDF spokesperson at the time.

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