On Wednesday, Israel's Supreme Court ruled that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government violated the law when it fired Shin Bet head Ronen Bar due to its "lack of trust" in him.
The court ruled against the government, which had wanted the petition thrown out following Bar's announcement that he would resign on June 15 and the subsequent Cabinet decision to cancel his firing.
"The government is neither authorised nor permitted to act contrary to the law. It was the government of Israel that decided, years ago, that the appropriate way to end the term of senior public servants, one of whom is the head of the Shin Bet, is by appealing to the advisory committee," wrote Supreme Court President Yitzhak Amit in the majority opinion.
Amit said the March decision to remove Bar from his position was also unlawful due to "lack of a factual basis, absence of a [dismissal] hearing and argument, and acting under a conflict of interest".
The latter referred to suspicions against several aides of Netanyahu as part of the Shin Bet's "Qatar-gate" probe into the connection between elements in the Prime Minister's Office and Doha.
However, in light of Bar's decision to end his term, the court did not order the government to take any action in response to its ruling.
Instead, it issued a ruling in principle, stating, "there is a need to deter future similar and inappropriate behaviour."
Deputy Supreme Court President Noam Solberg, widely considered a conservative, was in the minority, ruling that the case was redundant.
Bar announced on April 28 that he was stepping down, citing personal responsibility for the failure to prevent the Hamas-led terror attacks in southern Israel on October 7, 2023.
"After years on many fronts, in one night on the southern front, the sky fell," he stated during a memorial for fallen Shin Bet personnel. "All systems collapsed. The Shin Bet also failed to provide early warning."
Bar added: "As the head of the organisation, I took the responsibility."
The move, and the subsequent government decision to cancel his firing, were widely reported as being aimed at averting a possible constitutional crisis if the court had ruled that he must remain in his role despite being dismissed by the government.
Announcing his retirement, Bar had expressed hope that the court would issue a ruling in principle. "The High Court of Justice hearing is not about my personal matter, but about the independence of future heads of the Shin Bet, and of course, to that end, I shall be prepared to attend any proceeding as required by the court in the future as well," he said.
"A clarification is required of the institutional protections that will enable every head of the service to fulfill his task, subject to the policy of the government, for the benefit of the public, independently and free of pressures, and thereby draw a clear line between confidence and personal loyalty," he continued.
Netanyahu first announced his intention to dismiss Bar on March 16, citing an "ongoing lack of trust" in the Shin Bet director. Four days later, the Cabinet unanimously approved the measure.
In an affidavit submitted to the court in April, Netanyahu accused Bar of having led the "greatest security failure" in the country's history.
"The operational principles set by Bar in the summary of the security discussion he held an hour and 15 minutes before the massacre are the greatest intelligence failure in the history of Israel," wrote the premier in an affidavit submitted to the Supreme Court.
"Bar's claim that he warned of war and alerted the entire system is false. He did not alert the prime minister, nor the minister of defence, nor the emergency response teams and security coordinators in the kibbutzim, and he did not order the evacuation of the Nova party," Netanyahu said.
Netanyahu's affidavit was in response to Bar's own court filing, in which he accused the prime minister of repeatedly acting in an illegal manner, including by asking the security chief to examine the funding of protests that have sought to bring down his right-wing government.
Bar also charged Netanyahu with telling him that in the event of a "constitutional crisis," or clash between the High Court and the government, Bar would be obligated to obey the latter.
