Israelis have been stunned by an explosive document that Ronen Bar — the beleaguered head of Shin Bet, the country’s domestic security agency — released earlier this week. Bar published an eight-page unclassified affidavit that he submitted to Israel’s High Court of Justice on April 22 to counter Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’ attempt to fire him due to his “lack of trust” in the security chief. Bar also submitted a lengthy classified affidavit, complete with appendices.

Bar’s document is an unvarnished indictment of Israel’s leader, who continues to pursue an increasingly unpopular war in Gaza and refuses to provide any plan for the future of the Gaza Strip other than “relocation” — in other words, expulsion of its two million Palestinian inhabitants. Netanyahu also refuses to authorize a commission of inquiry into the failures that led to Hamas’s attack on Oct. 7, 2023.

As Bar stresses in his affidavit, he sent a letter to Netanyahu “highlighting the need for a state commission of inquiry to investigate all aspects of the road that led to October 7.” He adds that his agency “conveyed the national security necessity of establishing … a commission of inquiry to the Cabinet secretariat.”

Bar asserts that his troubles and ultimate dismissal do “not lie in the professional realm but in a demand for personal loyalty to the Prime Minister.” He notes that “between November 2024 and February 2025, I made several decisions as part of my duties that related to the Prime Minister.”

In early November 2024, at the request of the military chief of staff, Bar opened an investigation into the theft of classified documents and their having been leaked to the media. Those leaks, which were reported to have come from one of Netanyahu’s media advisors, related to the negotiations with Hamas. They appeared to support Netanyahu’s case that the Gaza negotiations were going nowhere, an assertion that, incidentally, he continues to repeat even as Israeli forces have relaunched their punishing attacks on the Gaza Strip. There is little doubt that the November investigation infuriated the prime minister.

Bar notes that he “refused to sign a legal opinion whose aim was effectively to prevent the possibility of the Prime Minister continuing to testify in his [corruption] trial.” He also asserts that the Shin Bet had provided the government with “exceptional and repeated warnings” regarding Hamas throughout 2023 “which were ignored.”

Bar also claims that Netanyahu expressed “on more than one occasion, his desire to see the Shin Bet act against citizens involved in protest activity and demonstrations against the government. For instance, I was asked to provide information about the identities of Israeli citizens and protest activists … [and] was also made aware of an expectation to monitor protest funders.” Bar refused these requests, which went far beyond the Shin Bet’s writ. He also notes that these requests came after work meetings when Netanyahu would empty the conference room “with the clear intent of ensuring that these exchanges would not be documented.”

As Bar’s affidavit makes clear, the proximate cause of Netanyahu’s “lack of trust” in his leadership — the final straw for the prime minister — coincided with the Shin Bet’s opening of a second investigation, one that targeted “employees in the Prime Minister’s Office, on suspicion of their ties to Qatar — a country that the Prime Minister himself defined as a state that supports terrorism.” An initial consequence of that inquiry, which found that two of Netanyahu’s closest aides had received Qatari funds via a third individual, was that both men were placed under house arrest. It is noteworthy that in the face of the growing scandal that Israelis are calling “Qatargate,” Netanyahu has changed his tune regarding Qatar, asserting that Israel has not designated it as an enemy state.

Bar’s affidavit, which he buttresses with his classified material, paints a picture of a prime minister determined to mollify his extremist government partners and to avoid a negative outcome in his bribery trial. The majority of Israelis, unlike their leader and his far-right coalition partners, support a ceasefire and prioritize the return of the 59 dead and living hostages who have now suffered in captivity for more than 18 months. In the meantime, Israeli forces continue to pulverize Gaza’s population with no end in sight, while themselves continuing to suffer losses.

The war is also taking its toll on Israel’s economy. GDP growth shrank in 2023 from 3 percent to 1.5 per cent, and slowed to just 1 percent in 2024. The International Monetary Fund projects some improvement in Israeli GDP in both 2025 and 2026, but with an increase in inflation and a sharp reduction in the country’s current account surplus. And both Moody’s and Fitch have downgraded Israel’s credit ratings, coupled with a negative outlook for the next several years.

Ronen Bar is fighting to keep his job, but that will depend on the ruling of the High Court of Justice. Whatever the outcome of his case, however, Bar has painted an ugly picture of the Netanyahu government that will not be easily explained away nor forgotten anytime soon.

Dov S. Zakheim is a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and vice chairman of the board for the Foreign Policy Research Institute. He was undersecretary of Defense (comptroller) and chief financial officer for the Department of Defense from 2001 to 2004 and a deputy undersecretary of Defense from 1985 to 1987.