PM formally asks AG to probe other leaks from wartime security cabinet meetings

In the midst of an investigation into leaks of top secret documents from his office, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sends a letter to Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara asking her to look into separate leaks from cabinet meetings throughout the war.

“Since the beginning of the war,” he writes, “we have been witness to a never-ending flood of serious leaks and revealing state secrets.”

Netanyahu writes that the leaks come from cabinet meetings, the national security cabinet, hostage negotiators, and other settings at which no members of the government had been present.

“Till now,” he writes, “despite my repeated requests that these leaks be investigated and an end be put to them, nothing has been done.”

He says that Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar told him on Saturday that there must be an official request for an investigation.

Netanyahu includes a secret appendix listing leaks that he says were not investigated.

Parts of the PMO’s defense around the ongoing investigation is that, while other leaks were not investigated, those that could harm the prime minister are being investigated aggressively.

But the current investigation is not about just about a mere leak, rather the alleged theft of classified intelligence and its distortion by Netanyahu’s aides in order to influence public opinion regarding a potential hostage deal. Moreover, the main suspect in the ongoing Shin Bet probe allegedly gained access to classified intelligence despite having failed a security background check.