National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir sharply attacked Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara on Sunday morning, hours before her scheduled response to the Supreme Court on the petitions demanding that the Prime Minister dismiss him from his post.
“Gali Baharav-Miara is a criminal who obstructed investigations in matters where the Supreme Court ruled she has a conflict of interest. She fabricates cases against elected officials, openly works to carry out a coup against a democratically elected government, to cancel laws, thwart decisions, and block appointments - and now the peak: an attempt to fire elected officials,” Ben Gvir said.
He added: “I will not be deterred from continuing to carry out my duties as minister, to back our soldiers and police officers - which enrages her greatly - and I will not rest until her actions are investigated. Israel will not be a mafia state.”
In recent days, Prime Minister Netanyahu rejected Baharav-Miara’s demand to prevent what she described as the minister’s “interference in police operations.”
In a letter she sent Netanyahu last week, the Attorney General wrote: “Minister Ben Gvir is improperly and systematically interfering in the work of the police, and the foundations on which the Supreme Court ruling permitting his appointment relied have been undermined. The Prime Minister must address the issue. After attempts to establish effective safeguards - with the minister’s agreement - to prevent improper political interference in police work have failed, it is no longer possible to defend the independence of the police from his recurring pattern of improper intervention and harm to the rule of law and human rights. The agreed-upon safeguards do not adequately address the minister’s repeated conduct in violation of the law.”