The nation holds its breath, waiting with anxious anticipation for what will unfold on Saturday. Will the hostages be released? How many? And if not – what will Israel do? Will it resume the military offensive against Hamas, or will it seek another way to bring the remaining hostages home?Until then, three seemingly small incidents from the past week offer a glimpse into how members of this government view their responsibility for the crisis Israel finds itself in. They expose not only their priorities but also their utter contempt for the very people they have been elected to serve. MK MOSHE GAFNI, chairman of the Knesset Finance Committee, leads a committee meeting earlier this month. At a meeting this week, Eyal Eshel, father of Roni Eshel, a surveillance soldier murdered on October 7, said to Gafni: 'Look me in the eye.' Gafni replied: 'I don't want to.' (credit: YONATAN SINDEL/FLASH90)'Look me in the eye'One of the moments came on Wednesday in the Knesset Finance Committee. As they have done almost every week over the past year, families of Israelis murdered by Hamas on October 7 gathered to plead with the Knesset members to establish a state commission of inquiry. Their demand came just days after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened a meeting in which his ministers performed every verbal gymnastic possible to avoid launching such an inquiry. The ministers' excuses at the Sunday night meeting were predictable. “The war is ongoing” (not exactly true). “The Supreme Court president has no authority to appoint the commission” (also false). “There are other ways to investigate” (of course – if you want those investigations to be biased and politically controlled).Then, on Wednesday at the Finance Committee, came a telling exchange. The committee meeting, chaired by veteran haredi (ultra-Orthodox) MK Moshe Gafni, was in full swing when Eyal Eshel, father of Roni Eshel – a female surveillance soldier brutally murdered on October 7 – addressed Gafni directly.“MK Gafni, I have one request – establish a state inquiry commission.”Gafni turned his gaze away.“Look me in the eye,” Eshel pleaded.“I don't want to,” Gafni replied.“You don't want to look me in the eye?”“No.”It was a brief, almost surreal exchange. But it revealed everything. Gafni, a politician who has been in the Knesset for almost 40 years, refused to even meet the gaze of a grieving father. This is the level of contempt Gafni and others in this government have for the citizens of Israel – people whose loved ones paid the ultimate price because of their failures. Gafni and his friends see themselves as untouchable. They believe they are above scrutiny and above accountability.'If they want war, they'll get war'The second moment came on Tuesday when the State Attorney's Office announced it would indict three senior Netanyahu aides for witness intimidation. The case involved an incident in 2019 when the trio allegedly sent a car with a megaphone to the home of a key witness in the prime minister's corruption trial to harass him.The aides in question? Ofer Golan, a longtime spokesman for the Netanyahu family; Jonatan Urich, one of the prime minister's closest advisers; and Israel Einhorn, another campaign strategist who is also entangled in the leaked intelligence documents affair inside Netanyahu's office.Yet the real story wasn't the indictment itself. It was the response Golan and Urich put out.“After six years of torture… after the Supreme Court ruled that police actions were illegal… State Attorney Amit Isman has the audacity to file a two-paragraph pathetic indictment. If they want war, they'll get war.”Read that again: “If they want war, they'll get war.”This wasn't a statement from some fringe members of society. These are two current senior advisers to the prime minister – men who sit in on classified security discussions, have access to the country's most sensitive secrets, and to the most powerful politician. And when confronted with criminal charges, they didn't say: “We look forward to clearing our names in court.” They issued a threat. This isn't how public servants speak. This is how the mafia speaks. No humility. No accountability. Just war.Luxury suitesThe third moment, easily lost in the endless churn of Israeli news, happened on Monday, just two days after Or Levy, Ohad Ben-Ami, and Eli Sharabi were released from Hamas captivity. They emerged from almost 500 days of captivity, shadows of their former selves, evoking painful echoes of a darker time in Jewish history.Where was Netanyahu when this happened? Not in Israel. His meetings with Trump and other officials had long ended, yet he chose to stay in Washington – spending the weekend in a luxury hotel suite. Could he have returned? Of course.This is precisely why Netanyahu fought to have the state's private jet, Wing of Zion, at his disposal. Even Shabbat is no excuse, not that Netanyahu is exactly observant. But even if he were, being in Israel for the return of hostages is the very definition of pikuach nefesh, the principle that saving lives overrides religious restrictions. On Monday, when Netanyahu had finally returned from his trip, he appeared in court to take the stand in his ongoing corruption trial and launched a tirade against the prosecutors.“For eight years, you've been dragging me through this hell,” he fumed. “For what? Have you no shame?”Hell?Thirty-six hours earlier, three hostages had stepped out of a tunnel where they were kept for nearly 500 days. They had actually been through hell. And Netanyahu? He had just checked out of the Willard, a five-star hotel.To call his legal troubles hell – after he and his lawyers spent years using every trick in the book to delay the trial – is not just tone-deaf. It is a profound disconnect from reality.That's just part of the story. Since October 7, Netanyahu has flown to the US three times. How many times has he visited Kibbutz Nir Oz, for example, the place where one in four residents was either murdered or abducted by Hamas? Not once.This is not what leadership looks like. Real leaders don't just take credit for the good. They bear responsibility for the bad. They stand with their people also in times of pain and look them in the eye.Israel deserves better.The writer is a senior fellow at the Jewish People Policy Institute and a former editor-in-chief of The Jerusalem Post.
