Netanyahu says there’s no record he told Bar to obey him over High Court, but doesn’t deny saying so

In his affidavit to the High Court, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tries to dispel Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar’s allegation that he ordered him to obey the premier over the Supreme Court in the possibility of a constitutional crisis, but he does not outright deny it.

Netanyahu writes in his submission to the court in response to petitions against his firing of Bar, that the accusation “was different from the claim in [Bar’s] confidential affidavit,” and that there is no record of such comments in the meeting in which Bar alleged they were made.

“It should be pointed out that from the minutes of the meeting from that date, there is no mention of a conversation on [that] topic, for sure there are no quotes which he included in his confidential affidavit,” writes Netanyahu.

The prime minister does not, however, claim explicitly that he never made such comments to Bar.

In Bar’s own affidavit to the court last week, he claimed that in conversation with Netanyahu, “it was made clear to me that in the event of a constitutional crisis, I would be expected to obey the prime minister and not the High Court of Justice. Full details of this matter are included in the classified affidavit.”