National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, whose office oversees the Israel Police, asked the High Court of Justice on Thursday to order the publication of all documents regarding the reported secret Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) investigation into the right-wing minister.
Ben-Gvir’s request was submitted in response to proceedings seeking to order Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to fire him, which the Supreme Court, sitting as the High Court of Justice, will hear on April 7.
“The fact that a security agency carries out an intelligence-gathering operation against a sitting minister, the police commissioner, as well as the commander of the Israel Prison Service—all without any basis in evidence, solely due to political affiliation—should shock every citizen in a democratic state,” Ben-Gvir was cited as saying by local media.
On Monday, the Shin Bet denied media reports that it has conducted an investigation against Ben-Gvir and the police since at least September.
In a letter to his staff dated Sept. 26 and published by Israeli Channel 12 TV network on Sunday, outgoing Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar wrote that the spread of Kahanism, an ideology based on the radical views of Rabbi Meir Kahane, into the Israel Police was “a dangerous phenomenon.”
Wrote Bar, “We must continue to gather evidence and testimonies of the involvement of the political echelon in the security echelon’s actions, in the direction of the use of force in a manner that is contrary to the law, and come up with some findings,” according to the Channel 12 report.
Ben-Gvir noted in his request to the Supreme Court on Thursday that the ISA investigation would show “no wrongdoing” on his part, accusing Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara of withholding this information in an “attempt to harm the legitimacy of a legally appointed minister.”
“If there was an intelligence-gathering operation on political grounds, this constitutes an unprecedented violation of the state’s fundamental principles and the public has the right to know the whole truth,” added the leader of the Otzma Yehudit Party. “I will not allow democracy to fall victim to secretive mechanisms operating from foreign motives,” concluded Ben-Gvir.
Last week, the Cabinet unanimously approved a proposal by Netanyahu to remove Bar as the head of the Shin Bet. His dismissal has since been temporarily frozen pending legal challenges before the High Court.
On Sunday, Cabinet ministers voted to back a “no confidence” motion against Baharav-Miara, setting in motion the process of her dismissal.
In Israel, the attorney general does not work for the prime minister, as opposed to in the U.S., where the AG is an agent of the executive branch. Netanyahu and other ministers have often clashed with Baharav-Miara, who was appointed in 2022 by the government of Naftali Bennett.
Ben-Gvir’s return as minister of national security last week was opposed by Baharav-Miara, who had claimed it was illegal to reappoint him amid the case seeking his dismissal due to alleged misconduct as the minister overseeing the police before he briefly quit in protest of the Gaza hostage-release truce.
In November, Baharav-Miara told Netanyahu he had “one last chance” to fire Ben-Gvir or risk a Supreme Court ruling ordering him to do so.
Baharav-Miara and other officials in the Attorney General’s Office have said that Ben-Gvir broke Israeli law and exceeded his powers as police minister by meddling in law enforcement and delivering direct orders to officers, which would also violate court injunctions banning him from doing so, in particular when it came to anti-government protests.
According to local reports, Netanyahu told fellow ministers at a Cabinet meeting on Nov. 10 that he would refuse to dismiss Ben-Gvir, saying that Baharav-Miara’s demand could pave the way for a “constitutional crisis.”