Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday publicly accused the head of Israel’s domestic security agency of lying to the country’s top court, the latest twist in a legal battle over Mr. Netanyahu’s attempt to fire the security chief, Ronen Bar.
In an acerbic 13-page affidavit defending his decision to remove Mr. Bar, who leads the Shin Bet, Mr. Netanyahu sought to rebut stunning allegations that Mr. Bar made against the prime minister in an equally scathing affidavit that Mr. Bar submitted last week to Israel’s Supreme Court.
The extraordinary exchange of recriminations came as part of a case brought by Israeli watchdog organizations and opposition parties against Mr. Netanyahu’s decision to oust Mr. Bar, with his government’s full approval, citing a lack of trust between them.
Mr. Bar has said that the decision to remove him stemmed not from professional considerations, but from “an expectation of personal loyalty.”
The case has roiled Israel, epitomizing a long-running domestic crisis that pits Mr. Netanyahu’s hard-line, right-wing supporters against more liberal Israelis over the balance of power between branches of government and the character of Israeli democracy.
To be able to rule on the validity of Mr. Bar’s ouster, the court might now have to decide which conflicting affidavit is more credible. Alternatively, the justices could strive for a compromise, with an agreed-upon date for Mr. Bar to step down.
Mr. Bar had accused Mr. Netanyahu of placing personal loyalty above respect for the rulings of the Supreme Court should a constitutional crisis occur. He also said that the prime minister had pressed for the improper use of the Shin Bet’s powers to spy on Israeli citizens who had led or funded antigovernment protests.
Mr. Bar said he had been asked to sign an opinion — drafted by Mr. Netanyahu or his aides and based on what Mr. Bar suggested were spurious security arguments — that would have hampered the progress of an ongoing corruption trial that involves the prime minister. Mr. Netanyahu is charged with bribery, fraud and breach of trust, accused of providing wealthy supporters with regulatory favors in exchange for illicit gifts and favorable media coverage. In his own affidavit, Mr. Netanyahu rebuffed those assertions, using his authority to back up some of his arguments with selected quotations from transcripts of confidential meetings and reports that would ordinarily be classified for decades.
Regarding his trial, Mr. Netanyahu said he had merely asked Mr. Bar to provide an urgent security plan for his protection while testifying in court after Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia, launched a drone that damaged the Netanyahu family’s home in the Israeli seaside town of Caesarea.
Mr. Netanyahu argued that he did not want to delay giving testimony but only wanted the court hearings to be moved to a more secure location.
He described the claim that Mr. Bar was asked to spy on the leaders of legitimate protests as “a complete lie,” saying he was concerned only about instances of violence and harassment of public figures. Hitting back at Mr. Bar, Mr. Netanyahu accused the Shin Bet of having no qualms about overstepping its authorities when it came to chasing far-right activists.
Mr. Netanyahu did not explicitly deny Mr. Bar’s claims about the demand for loyalty in the event of a constitutional clash between the Supreme Court and the government, but Mr. Netanyahu said Mr. Bar had worded the complaint differently in the classified part of his affidavit.
In a detailed response on Sunday, issued hours after Mr. Netanyahu released his affidavit, Mr. Bar said it was “riddled with inaccuracies, slanted quotes and half-truths intended to distort the context and alter reality.”
Mr. Bar had traced Mr. Netanyahu’s loss of trust and desire to dismiss him back to a series of moves the security chief made in late 2024 and early 2025, including his decision to investigate Netanyahu aides suspected of security breaches in cases involving the leaking of classified documents and ties to Qatar.
Mr. Netanyahu contends in his affidavit that he lost all confidence in Mr. Bar on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas mounted its deadly surprise attack on southern Israel, igniting the devastating war in Gaza. Blaming Mr. Bar for not foreseeing or preventing the attack, Mr. Netanyahu said he was responsible for what he called “the biggest intelligence failure in Israel’s history.”
Mr. Netanyahu wrote, “You would have to rub your eyes to believe” the recommendations issued by Mr. Bar shortly before the attack, following some worrying signs of Hamas activity in Gaza.
Mr. Bar had advised against any broad Israeli actions that could lead to a “miscalculation,” Mr. Netanyahu revealed, sticking to what he described as a mistaken security concept of “preserving quiet in Gaza at any price.” (Mr. Netanyahu had also long subscribed to this policy, according to Mr. Bar.)
“While Ronen Bar was preventing actions out of fear of setting off a war, Hamas had already started a war!” Mr. Netanyahu wrote in his affidavit.
Mr. Netanyahu also rejected Mr. Bar’s claim that he had warned of war in the year before the Hamas-led attack, quoting snippets from transcripts of meetings and intelligence reports in which Mr. Bar said that Gaza was “deterred” and that Hamas’s leaders were not looking to start a war.
Mr. Bar had said long before Mr. Netanyahu’s decision to fire him that he would resign at an appropriate time as part of taking responsibility for the intelligence failure.
Isabel Kershner, a Times correspondent in Jerusalem, has been reporting on Israeli and Palestinian affairs since 1990.
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