Likud minister says it’s clear ‘entire government’ responsible for Hamas assault

Culture and Sports Minister Miki Zohar says the entire government is responsible for the devastating Hamas assault, but now is not the time to investigate.

“It is clear to me that [Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu and the entire government of Israel, and those who this happened on their watch, are responsible. That’s also clear to the prime minister,” Zohar tells Army Radio.

Netanyahu has so far refused to directly take responsibility.

But he did say last night that “everyone will have to give answers,” including himself, on the failures that led to Hamas’s bloody invasion on October 7 — the closest he has come to taking responsibility for failing to anticipate the devastating attack.

Zohar, from Netanyahu’s Likud party, says, however, that now is not the time to examine the failures.

“We can’t deal now with questions of guilt because we are in a war. I don’t want to investigate now what happened in the intelligence branch, or the operational branch, or on the political level. There will be an independent state commission of inquiry,” he says.