The government informed the High Court of Justice this week that, “due to the constraints of the Knesset’s schedule,” it had been unable to complete legislation establishing its proposed commission of inquiry into the October 7 massacre before lawmakers left for the election recess.
That explanation is difficult to square with the Knesset’s final week. The inquiry bill passed its first reading on July 6 but still required committee work and two further votes. The government now says it will revive the proposal after the October 27 election, while asking the court to dismiss petitions seeking a state commission of inquiry because the issue should be left to voters.
The outgoing Knesset nevertheless found the time and procedural flexibility to pass a series of far-reaching laws. It froze enforcement proceedings against qualifying haredi yeshiva students who failed to report for military service, only for the High Court to suspend the law hours later; enacted Basic Law: Torah Study while the military reports serious manpower shortages; weakened the attorney-general’s authority; and expanded gender-segregated academic programs into advanced degrees, prompting five Council for Higher Education members to resign.
The objections were public and repeated, but the coalition rewrote bills, accelerated committee proceedings and extended plenum sessions to secure their passage before the Knesset dispersed. Its final week showed that legislation could move quickly when the government considered the outcome politically important.
The haredi measures do not create a sustainable framework for sharing the military burden or address the growing economic and social costs of the existing arrangement. They looked less like an attempt to resolve that crisis than an effort to reassure political partners before an election.
Three years later, Israeli leaders find new excuses for Oct. 7 inquiry delays
The contrast with October 7 is difficult to ignore. In the first weeks and months after the massacre, senior officials spoke as though a national reckoning was inevitable. Netanyahu said on October 25, 2023, that the failure would be investigated “to the last degree” and that everyone, including him, would have to provide answers once the war ended. Then-defense minister Yoav Gallant later called for an objective state commission of inquiry into the government, military and security agencies, including himself and the prime minister.
As time passed, however, the debate shifted. The government first argued that an investigation could not begin during the war, then focused its opposition on the existing law, under which the Supreme Court president appoints the members of a state commission. Netanyahu argued that a commission selected by Supreme Court President Isaac Amit would not command public confidence.
That reframing turned a demand for answers about October 7 into another dispute over the judiciary. The focus moved from why an independent inquiry had not been established to whether Amit could be trusted to appoint one, allowing the government to argue about the investigators rather than the conduct that required investigation.
Nearly three years after the massacre, Israel still has no comprehensive, independent examination of how the state failed before the attack, why the border was left so vulnerable, how intelligence was assessed and ignored, why communities and military positions waited hours for help, and how responsibility was divided among the political and security leadership.
The State Comptroller’s investigations cannot fill that gap, and Israel has no sitting state comptroller. The High Court ruled in June that Matanyahu Englman had exceeded his authority in four central October 7 inquiries, including those examining Israel’s policy toward Hamas, the Gaza border defenses, intelligence handling and the conduct of the political and security leadership. Four other reports must be restarted because those facing potential findings were not properly given an opportunity to respond.
Families, survivors long-promised Oct. 7 investigation
Days later, the court annulled the Knesset vote electing Michael Rabello after finding that violations of the secret ballot could have affected the result, and ordered a new election. Englman’s term has since ended, but the Knesset entered its election recess without choosing a successor.
Four central inquiries have therefore been halted, four others sent back to an earlier stage, and the institution itself has no elected head. No existing body is conducting the comprehensive investigation the country was promised.
The government’s alternative bill was already designed around its objections to the established mechanism. Instead of allowing the Supreme Court president to appoint a state commission, it gave political actors a central role in selecting its members. Because the opposition refused to participate, the revised proposal could ultimately have allowed a commission composed only of coalition appointees to begin operating.
The government now tells the High Court that the form of the investigation lies “at the heart of a political dispute” and should be left to the election, while also maintaining that the Knesset’s schedule did not allow it to complete even its preferred bill. Legislation tailored to the government’s own concerns was apparently less urgent than protecting draft evaders, weakening the attorney-general and expanding gender separation in universities.
For the families who lost relatives on October 7, the survivors, and the communities that waited hours for help, the argument over the inquiry’s structure has long since become secondary to the fact that no inquiry has begun. Members of the October Council marked 1,000 days since the massacre this month by again demanding a state commission of inquiry, saying the country cannot begin to repair itself without knowing what happened and who was responsible. That is the minimum a functioning state owes those it failed.
The government may be correct that the inquiry will now become an election issue. Voters should judge not only which commission they prefer, but what it says about a government that moved quickly when its coalition arrangements were at stake and then cited scheduling constraints when asked to investigate the greatest failure in Israel’s history. They should not mistake campaign promises of accountability for accountability itself, or allow another request for trust to replace the answers withheld for almost three years.