Last Wednesday, a debate took place in the Knesset plenum on the basis of 40 signatures of opposition MKs, in the presence of the prime minister. One of the issues raised was the opposition’s demand to immediately establish a state inquiry commission regarding the background to the October 7 catastrophe and government failings since then.
To explain his refusal to establish such a commission immediately, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the following tale: “I got hold of a letter sent by the Duke of Wellington [a British general in the Napoleonic wars] to the Foreign Office in London. He was in Spain, on the way to Portugal.
“An investigation committee [the Foreign Office] had established was on its way to him. It convened and asked for information about the number of saddles for horses and tent sheets. Wellington replied: I appreciate this investigation and would like to report on a shortage of several pounds sterling in one battalion. And there is the question of jam jars in another battalion – but please decide between these two assignments. Do you want me to engage in answering your unelected officials, or defeat Napoleon?
“I now wish to defeat Hamas. There will be time later to check all the jam jars and other things.”
Such a letter was actually sent by the Duke of Wellington during the Peninsular Campaign on August 11, 1812, even though Netanyahu distorted some of the details, for his own convenience.
After Wellington had explained (undoubtedly tongue-in-cheek) that the bothersome investigation had raised two regrettable findings of “the sum of one shilling and ninepence... unaccounted for in one infantry battalion’s petty cash, and... a hideous confusion as to the number of jars of raspberry jam issued to one cavalry regiment during a sandstorm in western Spain,” he asked which assignment he is to pursue:
“To train an army of uniformed British clerks in Spain for the benefit of the accountants and copy boys in London,” or “to see to it the forces of Napoleon are driven out of Spain.” He added that he couldn’t perform both assignments simultaneously.
THE STORY about Wellington is undoubtedly cute, but it is not relevant to the demand placed by the opposition in Israel, and by the hostages’ families, regarding the immediate establishment of a state inquiry commission. What the British Foreign Office was trying to do was to check whether Wellington’s forces were using their resources efficiently.
Will Israel ever receive answers?
What those demanding the immediate establishment of a state inquiry commission in Israel today want is, inter alia, to examine what had led up to the events of October 7, and why – despite occasional statements by the government that the problem of the remaining 120 hostages is at the top of its war goals – Netanyahu seems to be deliberately stalling on this issue.
It is preposterous to suggest that the victims of the horrors committed by Hamas on October 7, and the fate of the surviving hostages taken by Hamas to the tunnels of the Gaza Strip, can be compared to “saddles, bridles, tents, and tent poles, and all manner of sundry items for which His Majesty’s Government holds me [the Duke of Wellington] responsible,” including an unknown quantity of raspberry jam jars.
Furthermore, while the Duke of Wellington did not deny his responsibility for the supplies and welfare of his troops, Netanyahu and most of his ministers deny any responsibility for the events that led up to October 7, and for the government’s failings since then.
Yes, there is a problem opening a major investigation in which many figures at the top of the political and military establishments are liable to be ousted from office while a war is being waged.
However, the situation has been going on for over nine months, and despite that Netanyahu keeps arguing that we are just a step away from total victory, the situation looks like a monotonous rut, with occasional highlights (like that of this past Saturday), leading nowhere in particular.
In addition, the impression one gets is that Netanyahu’s decisions are based primarily on what will enable the survival of his government, which inter alia, leads him to seek the continuation of the fighting for many months to come, without any strategic plan for how to end the war, and how to manage its aftermath.
In other words, as our system of government appears to be purposelessly rambling on, Netanyahu seems to be accountable to no one, even though all the opinion polls suggest that if elections were held today, Netanyahu would lose his majority of 64 Knesset seats.
However, in 2022, when the Government of Change was still in power, Netanyahu, as opposition leader, and his colleagues fought vociferously for a state inquiry commission to investigate the alleged illegal use of the Pegasus spyware by the Israeli police. This was an unusual step for Netanyahu, especially since he has been suspicious of such commissions in light of his own indictments in November 2019.
This suspicion is enhanced by the fact that state inquiry commissions are appointed by the president of the Supreme Court, at the request of the government or the Knesset State Control Committee, and are invariably headed by an acting or retired Supreme Court justice or district court judge, most of whom are believed to hold left-wing, liberal positions.
Netanyahu’s experience with such commissions in the last year appears to justify his suspicion, though it can be argued that it is his problematic conduct in recent years that justifies the results, and not any preexisting prejudices of the commissions.
In March 2024, the state inquiry commission into the Meron catastrophe of April 2021, in which 45 ultra-Orthodox men were killed, declared that Netanyahu was one of several persons personally responsible for what had happened.
Three and a half months later, the state inquiry commission on the submarine affair, which involved the €2 billion purchase of submarines and missile vessels by Israel from the Thyssenkrupp shipbuilder in the years 2009-2017, declared in a warning announcement that “Netanyahu had endangered Israel’s security, and had caused harm to its economic interests.”
MANY BELIEVE that as long as Netanyahu remains prime minister, there is no chance that a state inquiry commission will be established to investigate the background and aftermath of October 7 and those, both in the government and military establishment, responsible for what occurred.
Though last Saturday’s brilliant attack by the Israel Air Force on the Houthi port of Hodeidah in Yemen in retaliation for the Houthi UAV that exploded over Tel Aviv the previous day, was a boost to the Israeli morale, it does not change the demands sounded in the Knesset debate last Wednesday.
We still have no idea what Netanyahu will say next Wednesday in his fourth address before a joint session of Congress, nor what will be said in his prospective meetings with President Joe Biden, and former president Donald Trump, who is now the official 2024 Republican candidate for president.
The pressure for the immediate establishment of a state inquiry commission will be relieved, should Netanyahu be convinced during his US visit to be forthcoming in an agreement with Hamas concerning the release of all the hostages, in return for a prolonged ceasefire and the release of numerous Palestinian prisoners and detainees.Let it be.
The writer worked in the Knesset for many years as a researcher, and has published extensively both journalistic and academic articles on current affairs and Israeli politics. Her most recent book, Israel’s Knesset Members – A Comparative Study of an Undefined Job, was published by Routledge.