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Lapid meets Netanyahu, vows support for war

The opposition leader said he had assured the Israeli premier of his “full backing” for “Operation Roaring Lion.”

Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid (Yesh Atid Party) visits the Beit Shemesh site where an Iranian ballistic missile killed nine Israelis, March 2, 2026. Credit: Yair Lapid/X
Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid (Yesh Atid Party) visits the Beit Shemesh site where an Iranian ballistic missile killed nine Israelis, March 2, 2026. Credit: Yair Lapid/X

“All of Israel is united behind the operation” against the Iranian regime, Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid reiterated following a security briefing with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday.

Lapid, visiting the site in Beit Shemesh where nine Israelis were killed by an Iranian missile the previous day, said he had assured the premier of his “full backing for continuing the operation” during the meeting.

“Images like the ones we’re seeing in Beit Shemesh are heartbreaking and unforgivable,” stated the leader of the opposition Yesh Atid Party.

Lapid on Saturday already conveyed a message of national unity, saying that “in moments like these we stand together—and we win together.”

Addressing the war against the Islamic Republic, he tweeted in English: “The people of Israel are strong. The IDF and the Air Force are strong,” adding, “The strongest power in the world stands with us,” referencing the United States.

“There is no coalition and no opposition, only one people and one IDF, with all of us behind them,” Lapid wrote.

“Let the message to the IRGC be clear: If you shoot at two of our ships, we will impose an even higher economic cost—taking out three of yours.”
Crowds thronged the plaza at Judaism’s second-holiest site, with the event broadcast on giant screens along the Old City walls.
The meeting included a reunion between two Satmar rebbes who have been at odds since a succession dispute divided the community after their father’s death in 2006.
“By welcoming Mamdani into a Jewish space as if he were safe, we tell Jews to lower their guard and tell everyone else that our concerns are overblown,” Inna Vernikov told JNS. “They are not.”