It’s now six weeks into the most recent Gaza conflict that has proven to be immune to cease-fires. Now, Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is facing tremendous pressure in the Knesset and in the security services for a criminal investigation into a leak of a document that reveals that Israel has been planning to reoccupy Gaza all along.
The leak occurred back in early August. A top-secret military briefing was delivered in late July or early August to Israel’s eight-member security Cabinet.
There were more than a dozen people present, and it is believed by the Netanyahu administration that at least one of them had a motive to leak the military’s analysis. But strangest of all, the prime suspect, according to reporters who have spoken to participants, is now looking like Netanyahu himself.
“Every political reporter that you ask will confirm to you that this leak came from the prime minister’s office,” a senior correspondent, Ben Caspit of the right-wing daily Ma’ariv said on August 6, the day after the leak was first reported on local Israeli Channel 2 News.
Since then, the same leak has hit nearly every other Israeli news outlet.
The leak tells us a great deal about the Gaza campaign and what the intentions were behind it. It also highlights the sharp divisions within the Israeli leadership as to how to respond to Hamas.
The topic of the briefing specifically was the challenge of reoccupying Gaza and disarming Hamas through such an occupation. The briefing explained that after taking over, Israel would certainly face violent chaos for several more years until the Israel Defense Forces and Shin Bet are able to get an intelligence network in place and thereafter “stabilize Israeli rule.”
The briefing acknowledge that IDF soldiers will face a high risk of kidnapping throughout the span of these years.
On August 5, Justice Minister Tzipi Livni stormed out of a Cabinet meeting after hearing the leaked report, “stormed back in” to confront Netanyahu. She demanded that every Cabinet member be given a polygraph test.
There are several theories about who is responsible for the leak. Those who think Netanyahu is behind it think that he wanted to create the appearance that the army forced him keep military options “limited.”
Others believe the leaker wasn’t Netanyahu at all. The most well-known Haaretz military analyst Amir Oren, said that “One branch of the defense establishment suspects that the mole’s last name rhymes with the name of a certain country with which Netanyahu is obsessed.” This would suggestion that either Erdan or Lieberman are behind the leak, as both rhyme with “Iran.”
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