Contradicting Netanyahu, A-G decides Shin Bet chief should investigate anti-settler remarks by intel official

Amid the ongoing struggle between the Israeli government and its Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara, who it is trying to dismiss, the two sides clashed once again after Kan 11 News revealed highly controversial statements by a senior official of the domestic intelligence agency, Shin Bet.

The government and the A-G have already clashed over the attempted dismissal of Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar, which will be subject to a court hearing on Tuesday.

Last Saturday, Kan published recordings from phone calls between the head of Shin Bet’s Jewish division, who is only known as “Aleph,” and the head of the police’s commander of the Investigations and Intel Unit in the Judea and Samaria District, Avishai Moalem.

Aleph sharply attacked both Jewish settlers and IDF soldiers in Judea and Samaria, and demanded that Moalem find ways to arrest and detain violent settler youth even without lawful arrest warrants.

“We always want to arrest them for interrogation, as much as we can. We hold these shmucks even without evidence, for a few days,” Aleph said, adding they should be put “in detention cells with rats.”

The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) on Saturday called the recordings “a real danger to democracy,” and said Netanyahu would “demand a thorough examination of the activities of the Shin Bet's Jewish division.”

“It is not possible in a state of law for citizens of the state to be arrested without evidence and placed in detention conditions that are illegal and cruel. Only in dark regimes does the secret service operate in this dangerous manner.”

The next day, the PMO emphasized that Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar, whom the government decided to dismiss from his post, could not be allowed to lead the investigation into the incident “because he was involved in it.”

“Per definition, the Shin Bet chief is the one who approves every arrest of a Jew, and the recordings also state that the arrests - for which the commander of the [police’s Serious Crimes Unit] fears there is no evidence - are being handled directly by the Shin Bet chief's office.”

The PMO added that since Bar has argued that Netanyahu was striving to exercise the Shin Bet’s power against civilians for political purposes, Bar now has an interest in ensuring he isn’t seen as having done the same.

The issue should be handled by the next Shin Bet director, the PMO stressed.

However, the A-G, who opposes the government’s dismissal of Bar, ignored and contradicted its instructions, and said that Bar would, in fact, investigate the matter.

Baharav-Miara stated that Aleph’s statements “require a thorough investigation as soon as possible,” and accused the government of “seeking to empty the judicial decision of its content” since Bar still “holds all the powers granted to him” after the court froze the government’s dismissal.

The leaked recordings also shed new light on an ongoing conflict between the Israel Police, the Shin Bet, and the IDF regarding the issue of violent settler groups in Judea and Samaria.

While international media coverage has focused on many violent incidents that go unpunished, settler organizations and politicians have decried the sometimes barely legal policy of arrests and detentions against settler activists.

Moalem is himself currently part of an investigation, and was placed on forced leave under allegations that he held off on prosecuting settler violence to earn a promotion from National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir. He is also suspected of bribery and several other crimes.

The PMO, meanwhile, argued that Moalem was only upholding the law against illegal demands from the Shin Bet, and alleged that the recordings are “further evidence of the corrupt conduct of the Shin Bet's Jewish division under Ronen Bar, in full cooperation with the Attorney General.”

In the new recordings, Moalem apparently takes the stance that the security services should adhere to the letter of the law, only arresting activists once there is a solid legal basis.

On the other hand, Aleph appeared to push the police to be proactive, arresting and detaining settler activists even on flimsy pretexts.

“Catch them in a vehicle from the Havat Gilad outpost, maybe there were combustibles in there, maybe they [settlers] smell of gasoline,” Aleph told Moalem in one phone call.

In another passage that drew particular outrage, Aleph criticized the IDF’s failure to deal with violent settlers, saying that the real army is in Lebanon and Gaza, while dismissing the troops in Judea and Samaria. “It’s a joke, it’s phalangists, it’s the settlers themselves,” he said.

Aleph stated on Monday that he had “erred” in his language and suspended himself from his post until the end of an investigation.

“The division and I operate solely according to the law and under a clear set of values. I deeply regret the style of the words that were said, which does not characterize the way I conduct myself vis-à-vis the other many entities with whom we work in cooperation,” he stated.