Jon Polin: Ronen Bar has shown highest level of accountability, integrity, decency

By Jessica Steinberg

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17 March 2025, 2:28 pm

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Jessica Steinberg, The Times of Israel's culture and lifestyles editor, covers the Sabra scene from south to north and back to the center

Jon Polin and Rachel Goldberg-Polin, whose son Hersh Goldberg-Polin was abducted from the Nova music festival in the October 7 attacks and later murdered in captivity, speak to Channel 12's Ilana Dayan, January 16, 2025. (Screenshot, used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)

With Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu planning to force Shin Bet head Ronen Bar out of his post this week, bereaved father Jon Polin, whose hostage son Hersh Goldberg-Polin was murdered in late August by his Hamas captors, writes on social media that Bar has conducted himself with nobility over the last 17 months.

“We have met many people in positions of power in the past 528 terrible days,” writes Polin. “One of those people who has shown the highest level of personal accountability, integrity, decency and humanity is Ronen Bar.”

He goes on: “While admitting his responsibility for the failure of October 7 and saying he will step down, Ronen has been committed to bringing home all hostages, returning the security of the State of Israel, strengthening national unity, and most recently, to establishing a state commission of inquiry that will examine everything and everyone, including himself. There is a nobility in how Ronen Bar has conducted himself in these 528 black days.”

The cabinet is set to meet on Wednesday to vote on dismissing Bar.

Protest groups are planning major rallies in Jerusalem against the move.