Ronen Bar, the head of Israel’s Shin Bet domestic security forces, denounced the extremist settler movement and its chief sponsor, the Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, as posing extreme danger to Israel. In a letter to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, reprinted by Channel 12 News on August 22, the Shin Bet chief proclaimed: “I’m writing you this letter in pain, great fear, as a Jew, as an Israeli, and as a member of a security force.”
Bar then referred to the “Hilltop Youth” extremist settlers, who regularly riot against West Bank Palestinians, and insisted their violence amounts to terrorism. He charged the extremists were encouraged by “a secret sense of backing” from police, who are under the orders of Security Minister Ben-Gvir. “The loss of fear of administrative detention due to the conditions they get in prison and the money given to them upon their release by Members of the Knesset, together with legitimization and praise, alongside delegitimization of security forces, contributes to the phenomenon’s continuation,” Bar wrote.
“The damage to the State of Israel ... is indescribable: global delegitimization, even among our greatest allies; spreading thin the IDF’s personnel … which wasn’t intended to deal with this; vengeful attacks that are sparking another front in the multi-front war we are in; putting more players into the cycle of terror; a slippery slope to the feeling of a lack of governance … a massive stain on Judaism and us all.”
