Netanyahu said to tell MKs there was ‘no treason’ on Oct. 7, countering his son’s conspiracy theory

Addressing a closed meeting of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee on Thursday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly sought to once again distance himself from the failures surrounding Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack, averring that the intelligence presented to him did not indicate such an invasion and that his previous efforts to deter Hamas were thwarted by defense officials.

According to leaks to Hebrew media outlets from the meeting, the prime minister also told committee members that while “there was a serious intelligence failure” ahead of the October 7 attack, “there was no treason.”

When asked about the claims of treason by a committee member, presumably including those propagated without foundation by the premier’s son, Yair, Netanyahu said he wanted to remove the “cloud of treason” from October 7.

Netanyahu also reportedly claimed during the discussion that former Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar falsified the protocol of a meeting held early in morning of October 7, just prior to the Hamas attack, which launched two years of war in Gaza.

According to Channel 12 news, Netanyahu asserted that nobody had thought Hamas would attack ahead of that day.

The prime minister cited multiple discussions with senior officials, including Bar, former defense minister Benny Gantz and former prime minister Naftali Bennett, which he said show that they also believed Hamas was deterred. It was unclear from the reports when these apparent conversations took place.

Netanyahu also claimed that he had wanted to assassinate Hamas leaders in 2014 but was opposed by the security establishment. Last week, however, Channel 12 reported that the premier turned down 11 chances to kill Yahya Sinwar, the Hamas leader in Gaza, in the months leading up to October 7.

Netanyahu also reportedly claimed Thursday to lawmakers on the committee that Bar falsified a document from early on the morning of October 7, adding a clause that stated that he had given orders to update the premier. Bar stepped down from his position last year after Netanyahu moved to fire him from the role in a bitter dispute that ended up in the High Court of Justice.

Netanyahu, according to Channel 12, claimed that Bar retroactively changed a clause in the protocols of a Shin Bet meeting held early on the morning of October 7, before Hamas invaded. Bar, according to the prime minister, added wording to the effect that he ordered that Netanyahu be updated on that morning’s ongoing developments. In fact, Channel 12 said, the meeting protocols were entered into Shin Bet computers at 6:06 that morning, including the instruction to update the prime minister, and Netanyahu’s military secretary was indeed updated by the Shin Bet chief’s bureau chief at 6:13 — some 16 minutes before Hamas-led terrorists burst through the border.

The official minutes of Thursday’s meeting released by the Knesset Spokesman’s Office said that Netanyahu presented lawmakers with materials he had previously submitted to the State Comptroller from the years preceding October 7.

In December, the High Court of Justice ordered the comptroller to freeze his October 7 inquiry, amid petitions claiming that the probe is severely flawed, would taint evidence and the investigative process, and that only a state commission of inquiry could properly investigate the disaster.

Netanyahu attended the five-hour closed-door meeting and “responded at length to committee members’ questions,” the Knesset spokesman said, with discussions focused around the comptroller’s now-thwarted investigation.

The prime minister presented lawmakers with “materials relating to the question of when Hamas decided to turn the idea of an attack into an operational plan, and whether internal divisions within Israel were connected to that decision,” the Knesset spokesman said.

Netanyahu described the decision by the High Court to halt the comptroller’s October 7 investigation six days after his own testimony as having “unusual timing,” according to the Knesset spokesman.

“After two years in which the media has been rewriting history in real time, the prime minister came to the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee and set the historical record,” claimed committee chairman Likud MK Boaz Bismuth, a close Netanyahu ally. “Sometimes the truth is also an option. The question that should concern every household in Israel is why the High Court of Justice halted the state comptroller’s review process.”

Lawmakers from the opposition Yesh Atid party walked out of the meeting in protest, with the party tweeting that it would “not participate in this media circus, which is intended to evade responsibility and turn the committee into an empty PR show.”

“Netanyahu arrived with pre-prepared messages from his office in a desperate attempt to engineer public perception and rewrite history, but no spin will blur the failure: 2,000 Israelis murdered, communities conquered, children burned, and citizens kidnapped on his watch,” the party tweeted. “The faction members will continue to fight against his failed government so that such a debacle never happens again.”

Committee member MK Moshe Tur-Paz from Yesh Atid noted on X that Netanyahu had told the committee two months before October 7 that “Hamas is deterred.”

Opposition figures Gantz, Avigdor Liberman and Gadi Eisenkot all slammed Netanyahu on Thursday for his reported comments, accusing him of seeking to absolve himself of any blame for the biggest Israeli intelligence and strategic failure in decades.

Gantz — a former IDF chief and former defense minister — wrote on X that in 2014, “when I presented the option of conquering Gaza,” Netanyahu leaked the plan to the media “to frighten the public.”

“When I proposed taking control of the Netzarim Corridor — you were afraid,” Gantz added, referring to a strip of land bisecting the Gaza Strip. “When I spoke about replacing Hamas, you preferred separation and leaving ‘Hamas deterred and weakened.’”

Eisenkot accused Netanyahu of having a “selective memory” of the events before and after October 7.

“In October 2023, we voted together on the decision to destroy Hamas’s rule,” Eisenkot wrote Thursday. “I left the cabinet in June 2024 because you refused to advance its destruction. You are still failing at this task. You are running away.”

Liberman said Thursday that while Netanyahu purportedly claimed that nobody saw October 7 coming, “as defense minister, in December 2016, I personally handed him a severe warning document that described exactly the scenario that ultimately occurred.”

“He received it, he knew — and he chose to ignore it,” said Liberman. “Unfortunately, Netanyahu is once again fleeing from the truth.”