“We have come to the conclusion that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has personal responsibility” in the tragedy that occurred at Mount Meron, in Israel, in 2021, where 45 Jewish pilgrims died in a stampede, estimates a commission of inquiry , in a report made public on Wednesday March 6, very harsh towards Mr. Netanyahu.
According to the latter, “the disaster could have been avoided”. Mr. Netanyahu “knew or should have known that the site (…) had been poorly maintained for years” and could represent “a risk to the many participants” in the pilgrimage held there each year to mark the Jewish holiday of Lag Baomer, notes the commission in this report.
Benjamin Netanyahu has, with his services, “the responsibility to identify problems that could represent” a risk for human lives, and has “not acted as one would expect of a prime minister to correct this state of affairs », Said the commission of inquiry again. The report criticizes “a lack of governance” and “a culture of evasion of responsibility” within the Israeli executive.
This report comes at a bad time for the Israeli prime minister, who has been the subject of strong criticism in Israel for not having anticipated the unprecedented Hamas attack on October 7, which left some 1,160 Israelis dead, mostly civilians. , and caused major trauma in the country.
Warnings preceding the tragedy
The pilgrimage to Mount Meron, in northern Israel, brings together tens of thousands of Orthodox Jews each year around the presumed tomb of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, a renowned Talmudist from the 2nd century CE. On April 30, 2021, a giant crush in the section reserved for men caused the death of 45 pilgrims, including at least 16 children.
Responsible for supervising the operation of public institutions, the state controller’s office had twice, in 2008 and 2011, warned about deficiencies in the site’s equipment. Mr. Netanyahu returned to power in 2009, until 2021, after a first term from 1996 to 1999. He has been prime minister again since December 2022.
The leader of the Israeli opposition, Yaïr Lapid, estimated that Mr. Netanyahu should have resigned the day after the tragedy. “If Netanyahu is still prime minister, the next disaster is only a matter of time,” he wrote on X on Wednesday.
The commission’s report also indicted former Minister of Internal Security and current Speaker of the Knesset (Parliament), Amir Ohana, and recommended that the police chief, Kobi Shabtai, be removed from his post. Former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, who succeeded Benjamin Netanyahu in June 2021, had promised to set up this commission of inquiry, refused by his predecessor.
If criticism of the Netanyahu government was relatively muted during the retaliatory war in Gaza, with Israel having vowed to annihilate Hamas, it has not been extinguished. More than 30,700 people, mostly women and children, have been killed since the start of the war in the Palestinian territory, according to the Hamas health ministry.
