Shin Bet chief refuses a security detail to the man leading the polls against Netanyahu

Channel 12 reported on Saturday evening that Shin Bet director David Zini had decided not to provide a security detail to Gadi Eisenkot, the former IDF chief of staff whose Yashar party leads most polls ahead of the 27 October election. The decision was final and had already been conveyed to Eisenkot’s staff, who had repeatedly requested it, and was made despite social media threats against Eisenkot and warnings from the defence sector that hostile actors may target current and former senior figures; the Jerusalem Post’s version named Iran among those actors. On Sunday, Central Elections Committee chairman Noam Sohlberg, deputy president of the Supreme Court, confirmed the decision’s authorship on the record: “The Shin Bet director says there is no intelligence on harm to Eisenkot \u2014 and he is the professional authority on this issue,” adding that the committee is “not authorized” to intervene.

The Times of Israel reported that the agency will provide intelligence assistance instead of an armed detail, and that the Yashar campaign alleges political motives, arguing the threat to a former IDF chief is growing as the campaign intensifies. Haaretz went further in a signed highlight on Monday, writing that the refusal “has shocked Israelis on a number of levels” and asking whether Zini, “who recently okayed lifelong security for the Netanyahus, feel[s] more obligated to ensure Israel’s election is free and fair than he did about protecting the man who is currently the greatest threat to his boss' continued rule?” That juxtaposition is Haaretz’s opinion, not a finding; the underlying lifelong-security approval has not been independently verified here. ToI also ran an op-ed the same day headlined “Refusing security protection for Eisenkot is a dangerous gamble.”

Assessment: Two things are being conflated in the Israeli coverage and should be kept apart. The decision is confirmed \u2014 Zini owned it publicly, through the elections committee. The motive is contested and comes from the campaign that loses by it. Sohlberg’s formulation is the pivot: the professional authority says there is no intelligence, and no civilian body claims standing to test that assertion. That is a system with no external check on a security judgement with direct electoral consequences, which is the structural problem regardless of whether Zini acted in good faith. Watch whether the Shin Bet publishes any threat framework, and whether the lifelong-protection comparison survives verification.