Netanyahu's party steps up pressure for Shin Bet head to go

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party today accused the head of the domestic intelligence agency of turning parts of the service into “a private militia of the Deep State” and called for him to go, amid a deepening political crisis around the agency, Reuters has reported.

The accusation against Shin Bet head Ronen Bar, who is resisting an order for his dismissal, followed the arrest of an agency official on suspicion of leaking confidential information to journalists and a government minister.

Shin Bet, which handles counter-terrorism investigations, has been at the centre of a growing political battle pitting Netanyahu’s right-wing government against an array of critics ranging from members of the security establishment to families of hostages in Gaza.

A government bid to sack Bar, during an investigation by the agency into aides close to Netanyahu, has been frozen temporarily by the Supreme Court, which held a hearing into petitions against the dismissal last week.

According to Likud, Bar had lost the trust of the government and “must stop entrenching himself in his position and vacate his position immediately.”

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The case, which has fuelled demonstrations by thousands of protesters who accuse Netanyahu of undermining Israeli democracy, has exposed deep rifts between the government and one of the country’s key security organisations.

Part of the dispute centres around blame over the failures that allowed Hamas gunmen to attack communities in southern Israel on 7 October, 2023, when 1,200 people were killed — many of them by the Israel Defence Forces implementing the controversial Hannibal Directive — and 251 were taken hostage in Israel’s worst-ever security disaster.

Netanyahu said last month that he had lost confidence in Bar over Shin Bet’s failure to forestall the 7 October attack. However, critics have accused the prime minister of using the case as a pretext to stop a Shin Bet and police investigation into alleged financial ties between Qatar and a number of his aides.

Bar has acknowledged his agency’s failures ahead of 7 October and said that he would resign before the end of his term. Nevertheless, he has accused Netanyahu, who has not acknowledged any responsibility and rejected calls for a national inquiry into 7 October, of a major conflict of interest.

A Justice Ministry statement lifted a censorship order banning reporting on the case, but said that the identity of the official who had been detained could not be revealed.

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