{"id":283800,"date":"2026-02-10T11:50:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-10T11:50:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/283800\/"},"modified":"2026-02-10T11:50:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-10T11:50:11","slug":"yair-lapid-accuses-benjamin-netanyahu-circle-of-falsifying-intelligence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/283800\/","title":{"rendered":"Yair Lapid accuses Benjamin Netanyahu circle of falsifying intelligence"},"content":{"rendered":"

Opposition leader Yair Lapid on Tuesday called for a criminal investigation<\/a> into figures within Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu\u2019s inner circle, accusing them of falsifying official security protocols and manipulating intelligence materials in the lead-up to the October 7 Hamas<\/a> attacks.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe very strange and dangerous thing he published, he didn\u2019t write it alone. We need to know who wrote the security protocol reports, lied, and distorted them. In the end, someone took these intelligence materials and turned them into a false version,” Lapid said in a 103FM interview on Tuesday morning.<\/p>\n

He also claimed that individuals close to Netanyahu distorted sensitive information and presented it to the public in a misleading manner<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Israel'sIsrael’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stands with Defence Minister Moshe Yaalon (L) as he delivers a statement during a visit to an army base near the Etzion bloc of Jewish settlements in the West Bank November 23, 2015. (credit: EMIL SALMAN\/HAARETZ, REUTERS\/POOL)<\/p>\n

Lapid pushed back against Netanyahu\u2019s attempts to shift blame exclusively to the military establishment for the failures of October 7.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not that anyone says the IDF didn\u2019t fail, the IDF failed, and the government failed as well,\u201d he said. \u201cBut the idea that the prime minister thinks he can present us with snippets of distorted documents and say, \u2018I had only been prime minister for half a year,’ when six days before October 7, he issued an instruction to raise the number of workers from Gaza to an all-time high, is unacceptable.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lapid argued that selectively using intelligence while omitting the views of the professional security echelon undermines democratic accountability.<\/p>\n

\u201cTaking security discussions, cutting out what\u2019s convenient for you, erasing the views of the security echelon, and then saying you\u2019re just a guest on security matters is something that must not be done,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Response to Ehud Barak’s ties to Epstein<\/p>\n

The interview also addressed recent revelations involving former prime minister Ehud Barak<\/a>, including leaked correspondence and a recording tied to the Jeffrey Epstein documents. While distancing himself from Barak, Lapid condemned what he described as racist discourse emerging from the fallout.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s outrageous. The very act of bringing this discourse back, whether from the podium or in internal discussions, doesn\u2019t matter to me. The entire purpose of Zionism is to create unity here. Barak was a prime minister from the Left, and I\u2019m from the Center,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Lapid added that his contact with Barak in recent years had been minimal.<\/p>\n

\u201cDuring the protest movement, we spoke on the phone once every few months, and I haven\u2019t spoken to him in a long time. He\u2019s not an oracle and not a shmoracle. The central movement in Israeli society is people who make kiddush on Friday night and don\u2019t distinguish between colors.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lapid also commented on the representation of Mizrahim, Jews of Middle Eastern and North African descent, in Israeli politics.<\/p>\n

\u201cMeir Cohen once went up to the Knesset podium and told David Amsalem: check whether at the top of Yesh Atid there are more Mizrahim than in Likud\u2014and they were stunned,\u201d he said. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t matter whether it\u2019s Karhi and Amsalem or Ehud Barak in a quote. It\u2019s complete nonsense.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked about recent remarks by Yair Golan, who suggested retiring the term \u201cLeft,\u201d Lapid chose not to engage publicly.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not going to quarrel with other parts of the opposition on the radio,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u2018What kind of state will this be?\u2019<\/p>\n

Lapid went on to say that Israel faces a crossroads looking ahead.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re at a point where there\u2019s a question of what kind of state this will be: will it be a successful, advanced, prosperous state with a welcoming Judaism, or a dark and racist state?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n

He argued that many Israelis feel their quality of life has declined.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think there\u2019s a single Israeli citizen who says their life is better today than it was three years ago, when I was prime minister. I don\u2019t want to blacken Israelis\u2019 lives in their ears, but they know how they\u2019re living. Either go to the supermarket or turn on CNN.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the question of whether Israel\u2019s strategic position has improved amid the war, Lapid was skeptical.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are areas in which Israel\u2019s security has improved, but if you create a major disaster and then fix part of it, that\u2019s not a compliment to your leadership,\u201d he said. \u201cYour lives were cheaper, and the poison in Israeli society was much lower.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite his criticism of Netanyahu, Lapid said he wished him well ahead of the prime minister\u2019s expected meeting with the American president in Washington.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wish him success. When an Israeli prime minister goes to meet an American president at such a moment, you want him to succeed,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He also stressed that negotiations with Iran should address more than just the nuclear issue.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe most important thing is that the Americans\u2019 discussion with the Iranians not focus only on the nuclear issue, but also on ballistic missiles.\u201d<\/p>\n

Regarding Yesh Atid\u2019s lagging poll numbers, Lapid said he was unconcerned.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been in those places seventy times. When you have values, in the end it always pays off electorally too, because people know who\u2019s working for them,\u201d he said, pointing out that several of his political rivals are no longer in office. \u201cBennett isn\u2019t in the Knesset, Golan isn\u2019t in the Knesset, Eisenkot isn\u2019t in the Knesset\u2014we are.\u201d
Lapid concluded by reiterating his position on Iran and Israel\u2019s security doctrine.<\/p>\n

\u201cIsrael needs to maintain the principle that decisions about our security are made by us. I\u2019m not beating the drums for war on the radio, but the principle that we manage our own security has been seriously eroded\u2014see what\u2019s happening now in Kiryat Gat.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Opposition leader Yair Lapid on Tuesday called for a criminal investigation into figures within Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":283801,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,51,1031,85,46,82851,43,58,19344],"class_list":{"0":"post-283800","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-israel","8":"tag-benjamin-netanyahu","9":"tag-hamas","10":"tag-idf","11":"tag-il","12":"tag-israel","13":"tag-netanyahu-criminal-investigations","14":"tag-news","15":"tag-the-october-7-massacre","16":"tag-yair-lapid"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283800","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283800"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283800\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/283801"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=283800"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=283800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}