Do Israel's state inquiries solve the problems they investigate?

• Published date: 30 September 2021
• Author: YONAH JEREMY BOB
• Publication title: Jerusalem Post, The: Web Edition Articles (Israel)

Already, the commission probing the Mount Meron disaster is in full swing and has held weeks of hearings.

Last week, Public Security Minister Omer Bar Lev announced the establishment of a commission to inquire into the Gilboa Prison breakout fiasco.

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Though it has not yet happened, there is still talk of a commission to probe Case 3000, the Submarine Affair, delving into whether actions and decisions taken surrounding the affair were carried out properly. This would go beyond the criminal case that is already proceeding against many top aides to former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but which does not involve him as a defendant.

With these commissions seeming to be the flavor of the month to solve all of the country's problems, the question is raised as to how much they actually accomplish.

Some may see such commissions as a way to achieve major positive societal change.

Others see them as more of an expanded version of a court case, which means they still cannot, by themselves, solve major, multifaceted sociopolitical or socioeconomic dilemmas.

ONE OF the first major state inquiries that rocked the country and did change its direction in a variety of ways was the Agranat Commission of 1973.

Named for chief justice Simon Agranat, the commission probed the initial failures of the IDF and especially Military Intelligence in anticipating Egypt's and Syria's surprise attacks during the 1973 Yom Kippur War.

Egypt completely broke through the first line of Israeli military units, a debacle attributed by the commission to too much "group think" within Military Intelligence which believed that Israel's Arab neighbors would not dare to attack, because they lacked the capability to compete with Israel's air force.

The commission called for the dismissal of a variety of top IDF officials. Eventually, not only did IDF chief David Elazar and IDF intelligence chief Eli Zeira resign, but even prime minister Golda Meir quit (the commission did not specifically go after her, but the toxic politics of the war being deemed a failure dragged her down politically).

The right-wing Likud Party exploded to 39 seats in the Knesset, and the stage started to be set for Menachem Begin to eventually take control from the country's decades-long ruling Labor Party in 1977.

Yet, did the Agranat Commission improve the military in the critical ways...