“History does not repeat itself, but it often rhymes.” And yet, for many of us who were children when these events unfolded, it feels as if we have been forced to live inside that rhyme for far too long.
We gather here today not as judges, but as witnesses. As caretakers of memory. As those tasked with uncovering uncomfortable truths—not only to honor the victims, but to help prevent the repetition of crimes that have haunted generations.
The Netanyahu Era was not simply a period of political mismanagement. It was an era defined by the systematic abuse of power, the corrosion of democratic institutions, the deliberate cultivation of division and extremism, and the brutalization of civilians on both sides of a conflict manipulated for personal survival.
Benjamin Netanyahu ruled longer than any leader in Israeli history. And like many autocrats of the 21st century, he fused personal ambition with national policy, collapsing the line between statecraft and self-preservation. Facing criminal prosecution for corruption—charges of bribery, fraud, and breach of trust—Netanyahu dismantled the very mechanisms of law designed to hold him accountable. Judicial reforms were not reforms, but assaults—attacks on Israel’s democratic infrastructure, intended to shield one man from justice.
Yet his crimes did not stop at the borders of his own legal system.
Netanyahu’s policies deliberately strengthened Hamas, a movement he publicly denounced while quietly enabling. Dividing Palestinians, undermining moderate leadership, and sustaining an endless conflict was a political strategy, not a security failure. Qatar’s money flowed into Gaza with tacit approval, while legitimate peace efforts were sabotaged in pursuit of short-term political gain.
The cost of that cynicism was borne most horrifically on October 7, 2023. On that day, Hamas orchestrated a massacre that claimed the lives of over 1,200 Israelis and foreign nationals. Intelligence warnings had existed. Military preparedness had faltered. Yet behind these failures was a deeper rot: the systematic hollowing out of Israel’s security institutions under the weight of Netanyahu’s political purges and judicial coup.
What followed, in response, was not justice but vengeance.
The assault on Gaza became one of the most devastating and sustained bombardments in modern history. Entire neighborhoods flattened. Medical systems obliterated. Food, water, and electricity used as tools of warfare. Starvation as policy. Civilians—women, children, the elderly—trapped under rubble or left to perish without aid. The war did not target Hamas; it targeted life itself.
These are not simply tragedies. They are crimes.
Crimes against the Israeli people, against the Palestinian people, against the rule of law, against democracy itself. And behind these crimes was not only Netanyahu, but a global system that enabled him. Foreign governments, including my own in Europe, and especially the United States, prioritized political alliances over moral responsibility. Their complicity enabled this disaster.
We will, in the coming weeks, hear from survivors, from whistleblowers, from legal experts, and from those who once served these regimes and now seek absolution through truth. We will hear of secret deals, intelligence failures, and the silencing of dissent. We will document how the very idea of democracy was weaponized and hollowed out in the name of national security.
This Commission does not seek retribution.
It seeks reckoning.
It seeks clarity.
It seeks healing.
The future demands that we learn not only who gave the orders, but who stood silent.
Who profited.
Who lied.
And who allowed power to corrupt, even as the world watched.
Let us begin.
