Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed in an affidavit to the Supreme Court that Ronen Bar lied about having given warning of the war.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed in an affidavit he submitted today (Sunday) to the Supreme Court regarding petitions related to the dismissal of the head of the ISA that the statements of Ronen Bar about a warning of war are false, and called the intell gence failure ahead of the October 7th massacre “the greatest failure in the history of the State of Israel.”
Netanyahu added that in a situational assessment conducted by Bar at 5:15 AM on October 7, about an hour and a quarter before the massacre began, no warning of war was given. “Bar bears direct and immense responsibility for the failure to prevent the massacre. He did not awaken other security forces, but rather deluded them,” the affidavit states.
It is further stated that “Bar’s insecurity in maintaining calm in Gaza at all costs led him to hold on to his misconceptions out of fear that Hamas would interpret these actions as intentions of war on the part of Israel and thus go to war against us. While Ronen Bar talked about ‘miscalculation,’ Hamas had already attacked.”
“If Bar had called the IDF to prepare in ‘high readiness’ and not ‘medium and secret,’ and instructed the IDF to initiate broad action immediately, the massacre would have been avoided,” Netanyahu wrote in the affidavit.
He responded to Bar’s claim that he awakened the security system on the night of the massacre: “He did not awaken the Minister of Defense. He did not awaken the Prime Minister. He did not awaken the head of the National Security Council and IDF forces. He did not awaken the civilian emergency squads in the Gaza region communities. He did not warn those partying at the Supernova festival. He did not fulfill his main role that night.”
Netanyahu also claims in the affidavit that the claim that Ronen Bar provided “powerful warnings” regarding Gaza is false. Instead , Netanyahu claims, throughout 2023, Ronen Bar pushed for strengthening the economic situation in the Gaza strip and avoiding targeted assassinations to maintain calm.
The affidavit states that “Ronen Bar said that Sinwar is a reasonable leader” and noted that Bar said in cabinet discussions before the massacre that “the Gaza Strip is deterred”.
Regarding the request to delay his trial, he wrote that “contrary to Bar’s false statement, the Prime Minister never requested to delay his trial or cancel it, but on the contrary. The Prime Minister asked not to postpone the trial even for a day.”
Netanyahu also claimed political activity by the head of the ISA. “While operating agents at right-wing demonstrations, Bar fabricated lies about a demand to activate the ISA at left-wing demonstrations”.
In addition to the open affidavit, classified appendices were submitted to the court.
