“The people of Israel deserve answers about how the terrible failure happened and how to prevent it from happening again,” former prime minister Naftali Bennett published on X/Twitter.
The protest was organized by the October Council, an activist group made up of hundreds of families affected by the massacre.
“The people of Israel deserve answers about how the terrible failure happened and how to prevent it from happening again,” former prime minister Naftali Bennett, who was present at the protest, published on X/Twitter.
Other opposition leaders were present alongside Bennett, including Yair Lapid, Avigdor Liberman, Benny Gantz, Gadi Eisenkot, and Yair Golan.
“Tonight in the square, we gathered with one clear call – the establishment of a state commission of inquiry. In our government, this will happen in the first days,” Lapid wrote on X.
In a separate event at Hostage Square, families of the hostages gathered to demand the return of the three missing hostages whose remains are still held by Hamas in Gaza.
Strong message against Netanyahu
“Nine ministers and officials in the government of default and disaster were called this week for the despicable task of training the creep called the ‘Special Investigation Committee.’ Their mission is to ensure that the truth is not investigated and never comes to light,” former MK Yizhar Shai, father of the late Yaron Shai, a Nahal Brigade soldier who fell on October 7, said.
Shai served as an MK for Gantz’s Blue and White party, and was Innovation, Science, and Technology minister.
Lior Akerman, a former brigadier-general who served as a Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) division head, said he used to identify with the right-wing policies in Israel, but the current events have made him understand that “the problems are no longer between right and left.”
“For three years now, the government has been attacking and harming the state’s institutions, its security organizations, the legal system, and the law,” Akerman said. He also claimed that the current administration is trampling on the values of statehood, morality, and unity in an effort to create a dictatorship.
April 18, 1996 – During his military service, Bennett leads a unit into Lebanon during Israel’s “Operation Grapes of Wrath,” in which an Israeli artillery strike near a UN camp kills more than 100 civilians. The incident is known as the Qana Massacre.
1999 – Moves from Israel to New York to launch the tech start-up Cyota, a cybersecurity and anti-fraud software company.
2005 – Sells Cyota to RSA Security for $145 million.
2009 – Serves as CEO of Soluto, a software company, for several months.
January 2010-January 2012 – Serves as director of The Yesha Council, an organization representing Jewish settlements in the West Bank and their populations.
2012 – Leads the pro-settler party Jewish Home, making his desire to prevent the formation of a Palestinian state a central plank of his pitch to voters.
March 2013 – Appointed as Minister of Economy, Minister of Religious Services, Minister for Jerusalem and Diaspora Affairs.
November 5, 2014 – Writes in an op-ed in the New York Times, “The old models of peace between Israel and the Palestinians are no longer relevant. The time has come to rethink the two-state solution.”
February 2015 – Appointed as Acting Senior Citizen Affairs Minister
May 2015 – Appointed as Minister of Education and Minister for Diaspora Affairs.
June 2, 2021 – Lapid announces an eight-party coalition agreement has been signed. Under the agreement, Bennett will focus on domestic issues during his two years as prime minister, before he hands the reins to Lapid in August 2023.
December 12, 2021 – Bennett travels to the United Arab Emirates to meet with Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan. Bennet is the first Israeli prime minister to visit the United Arab Emirates.
February 14, 2022 – Travels to Bahrain to meet with Bahraini Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad al-Khalifa. Bennett is the first Israeli prime minister to visit Bahrain.
The EU is seeking to reset its often testy relationship with Israel next week, convening a summit on Monday of senior political figures for the first time in a decade.
The meeting format, known as the EU-Israel Association Council, has essentially been dormant since 2013, when Israel canceled a gathering in protest over the EU’s stance on Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Since then, the two sides have continued to clash over similar issues.
But the 2021 exit of hardline Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu opened the door for current rapprochement. His replacement, Yair Lapid, who also holds the foreign minister role, has embraced a two-state solution with Palestine — a position more in line with many EU countries’ approach, even if several countries are still expected to express disapproval of Israel’s Palestinian policies on Monday. Brussels is also eager to shore up energy supplies from Israel amid Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Lapid is expected to attend Monday’s council meeting.
“There’s a big hope that the upcoming association council between the EU and Israel will bring … a new wind into our relationship,” Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský told POLITICO last week at the United Nations General Assembly, expressing optimism that the development will be one of the key achievements of the Czechs’ six-month rotating EU presidency.
Still, getting EU consensus on one of the world’s most notoriously contentious conflicts is not going to be easy.
Countries like Ireland and Sweden have traditionally taken a more pro-Palestinian stance — Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas stopped off in Dublin for a meeting with the Irish prime minister earlier this month en route to the U.N. annual gathering. On the other end of the spectrum, Israel has strong supporters within the EU. Hungary, for example, is a staunch ally with economic and ideological bonds forged over the years between Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and Netanyahu.
Before the EU-Israel council went dark, it had served for more than a decade as a forum for officials to regularly meet and discuss these issues. Now, with the council set to be revived, member states are tinkering with an official communique that needs to satisfy the spectrum of views regarding EU-Israeli relations.
Finding common language can mean weeks of fighting over a single word while backroom deals are cut to appease the myriad interests at play. Palestinian officials are also watching closely, demanding not to be left out of a similar diplomatic engagement with Brussels.
The EU’s complicated role in the Israel-Palestine conflict has played out in numerous controversies this year alone.
This spring, the European Commission was forced to delay funding for the Palestinian Authority over the content of textbooks, which critics say included anti-Israeli incitements to violence.
The decision to block the funds was led by Hungarian EU Enlargement Commissioner Olivér Várhelyi. As POLITICO first reported, 15 countries sent a letter to the Commission in April blasting the move. Commission President Ursula von der Leyen finally announced the money would be disbursed during a visit to the Palestinian city Ramallah in July.
EU commissioner for neighbourhood and enlargement Olivér Várhelyi | Kenzo Tribouillard/AFP via Getty Images
Further tensions with Tel Aviv emerged following an Israeli raid in July on the offices of Palestinian NGOs.
Israel had accused the groups — some of which received funds from EU countries — of being terrorist organizations. But numerous EU countries weren’t convinced.
In a joint statement at the time, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden all blasted Israel, saying it had not supplied “substantial information” to justify the raids. The bloc reiterated those “deep concerns” in August after further Israeli raids on civil society groups.
Another dynamic affecting the EU’s relationship with Israel is the Continent’s energy woes. As Europe scrambles to find alternative sources of Russian gas, furthering energy ties with Israel is one possible answer.
In a June visit to Israel, von der Leyen signed a memorandum of understanding with Israel and Egypt to boost gas exports. The EU is also Israel’s largest trade market and accounts for about a third of Israel’s total trade.
But while economic imperatives explain part of the new push for engagement with Israel, long-term observers say the outreach also reflects a new willingness to engage with Tel Aviv after Lapid came to power this summer. Lapid entered office as part of a power-sharing arrangement with Naftali Bennett, who held the job for a year prior to him.
“I think it is a genuine shift,” said Maya Sion-Tzidkiyahu, who helms the Israel-Europe Program at Mitvim Institute, an Israeli think tank. “The change of tone was made by Lapid, who shares much of the EU’s normative stance on the liberal democratic world order. It’s now much more positive than during Netanyahu’s government, even if Bennett and now Lapid government is not advancing the peace process.”
Sion-Tzidkiyahu said mutually beneficial scenarios are helping to replace “megaphone diplomacy” with closer dialogue.
“Disagreements on contentious issues such as the Palestinian or Iranian one will not disappear, but perhaps there are now better understanding for the concerns of each side,” she said.
Lipavský, the Czech foreign minister, is aware of the concerns some EU countries have about the Israeli’s government actions in the West Bank and towards Palestinians.
“We need to discuss [these concerns] openly, but I don’t think that one issue should block the debate about the others,” he said.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen poses for pictures with Israel’s Yair Lapid | Pool photo by Maya Alleruzzo/AFP via Getty Images
Officially, the EU supports the two-state solution that sees a Palestinian state living side-by-side in peace and security with Israel — a vision also shared by the United States. But making that prospect a reality seems as far away as ever.
Sven Koopmans, the EU special representative for the Middle East peace process, wrote earlier this month that all parties needed to help identify ways to solve the man-made conflict.
“The current situation is increasingly seen as a structural human rights problem, in which Israel has the upper hand,” he wrote in the Israeli outlet Haaretz. “That negatively affects how the world perceives Israel, and holds risks for the long-term. It should not be that way.”
When it comes to resuming the peace process, Sion-Tzidkiyahu is not confident.
“Under the current political circumstances in the Palestinian Authority and Israel, such development is not foreseen,” she said. “At most, the EU can push for more practical steps by Israel to improve Palestinian’s condition.”
