Accountability Is Becoming Partisan in Israel
Support for a state commission of inquiry into the October 7 attack is collapsing along ideological lines. For many on the Right, it is increasingly viewed as hostile terrain.
In Israeli political culture, few mechanisms have carried as much symbolic weight as a state commission of inquiry. And yet, it seems, that ritual is now fraying.
The December 2025 Voice Index shows that 55% of Israelis still support a state commission of inquiry into the events of October 7 - but that figure masks a steep decline: down 9.5 percentage points since January 2025 and 12 points since July 2024.
At the same time, support for a government-appointed investigative committee has risen to 22%, up from 13.5% in July 2024. This shift is driven overwhelmingly by the Right.
According to the survey, support for a state commission among Jewish Israelis on the Right has collapsed to 36%, down from 57% in January 2025 - a drop of more than twenty points. Meanwhile, support among the Center (84%) and Left (100%) remains near-unanimous.
Likud voters are almost evenly split: 36.5% support a state commission, while 36% favor a government-appointed one. That divide is especially significant given Likud-backed legislation introduced last month proposed precisely such a politically appointed commission.
As someone who has covered Israeli politics and remains a member of the media, I’ve watched public trust in institutions erode, but rarely along such clean ideological lines.
For many on the Right, a state commission into October 7 is increasingly viewed as hostile terrain: not as neutral but dominated by elites, legal institutions, and media cultures perceived as adversarial.
The danger now is that accountability itself is becoming partisan.
Commissions only work when their conclusions, however painful, are accepted as legitimate by most of the public. If half the country enters the process convinced the outcome is predetermined, the commission may clarify facts, but it will not achieve the closure needed to heal the nation.
Israel has survived disasters before, but what made recovery possible was a shared belief that truth, once uncovered, mattered more than political survival. And that resolve and resiliency in people and institutions would thrive.
That belief is now in question.