Smotrich accuses AG, Shin Bet of working counter to Israel’s interests

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich accuses both the Shin Bet and the Attorney General’s Office of acting against Israel’s interests.

The Religious Zionism party chair joins claims by the far-right Otzma Yehudit party that the Shin Bet interfered with the appointment of the agency’s new chief, Maj. Gen. (res.) David Zini, while also accusing Attorney General Gali Baharav Miara of acting against “our fighters.”

“We will do everything to protect our fighters, our Judaism, our existence and security, and our democracy against those who undermine it under the guise of being ‘gatekeepers,'” Smotrich asserts in a statement.

“There are elements within the Shin Bet operating through spyware to thwart the appointment of a Shin Bet chief,” he claims, after Otzma Yehudit submitted a proposal to the Knesset on Monday to probe alleged Shin Bet interference in Zini’s appointment.

The party claims the security agency was attempting to “thwart” his appointment when it reported that Zini met with a Shin Bet officer whom it was surveilling on suspicion of leaking classified information to the Grunis Committee, which vets senior government appointments, according to a Haaretz expose.

Smotrich further accuses Baharav Miara of “acting against our fighters and commanders” while also engaging in “leaks tied to antisemitic blood libels against the State of Israel.”

Earlier today, the Attorney General’s Office opened a criminal investigation into the leaking of a video from the Sde Teiman detention facility, which apparently shows guards severely abusing a Palestinian security detainee.

“Does anyone need further proof of the critical need to clean out the stables and enact the necessary reforms in our judicial system and law enforcement?!” asks the lawmaker, who has long been a proponent of the government’s proposed overhaul of the nation’s judiciary.