Netanyahu picks former Navy commander Eli Sharvit to be next head of Shin Bet

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has decided to appoint former Navy commander Vice Adm. (res.) Eli Sharvit as the next head of the Shin Bet instead of Ronen Bar, whom the cabinet voted to dismiss earlier this month, the Prime Minister’s Office announced Monday morning.

Bar has not been formally relieved from his post, with a temporary injunction imposed on his dismissal by the High Court of Justice. While the court froze Bar’s firing, it allowed Netanyahu to interview candidates to replace him.

Netanyahu interviewed seven candidates, the PMO said in its announcement. Sharvit’s candidacy will now be reviewed by a vetting committee before the decision reaches the cabinet.

The PMO statement about Sharvit’s appointment noted that he had led the design of naval capabilities to defend Israel’s territorial waters, and that he oversaw complex operations against Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran.

“The Shin Bet is an organization with much credit to its name,” the PMO said, “which underwent a severe trauma on October 7.”

Netanyahu, said his office, “is convinced that Sharvit is the right person to lead the Shin Bet on a path that will continue the organization’s glorious tradition.”

Despite the vote of confidence from the premier, Sharvit previously participated in protests against his government’s judicial overhaul plans.

According to a report by Ynet in March 2023, Sharvit joined a protest on Tel Aviv’s Kaplan Street, alongside other former military officers. He did not issue a call to refuse to show up for duty, as other reservists did, but only expressed concern for the planned legislation, according to the report.

Sharvit also reportedly does not know Arabic and has never been involved in Palestinian affairs, though this would not be unprecedented for a Shin Bet head.

He began his service in the Navy in 1985, becoming an officer. Over the years, he commanded several missile boats and held other prominent roles.

In 2006, Sharvit was the deputy commander of the Navy’s missile boat fleet, and amid the Second Lebanon War that year he commanded one of its squadrons.

Between 2007 and 2009, he served as a department head in the IDF Operations Directorate, the only role that he held outside of the Navy. He then returned to command the missile boat fleet until 2011. Afterward, he was appointed to command the Haifa naval base, where he served until 2014.

Between 2014 and 2016, he served as chief of staff in the Navy before being promoted to the rank of vice admiral and becoming the commander of the Navy.

Sharvit commanded the Navy until 2021, including during the May 2021 conflict with Hamas. Since being released from the military, he has served in several top roles in civilian companies.

Earlier in March, Sharvit was appointed by IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir to be a member of a panel of former officers who are to examine and evaluate the military’s October 7 investigations.

Sharvit would not be the first Shin Bet head who comes from outside the organization and is unfamiliar with its workings, Arabic and Palestinian affairs. In 1996, Ami Ayalon, also a former commander of the Navy, was appointed to head the Shin Bet following the assassination of prime minister Yitzhak Rabin.

Earlier this year Sharvit, as CEO of Elgry Eco Energy, penned an op-ed blasting US President Donald Trump for his climate policies and for promoting fossil fuels.

“Trump’s shortsightedness sends a shocking message to the world of disregard for scientific reality, the well-being of humanity, and responsibility to future generations,” he wrote.

Sharvit’s selection comes after the government voted earlier this month to fire Bar, sparking mass protests.

Netanyahu said he had lost faith in the Shin Bet chief following the Hamas onslaught of October 7, 2023, when thousands of terrorists stormed southern Israel to kill some 1,200 people and take 251 hostages, sparking the war in Gaza.

After previously doing so anonymously, Netanyahu on Thursday claimed that Bar knew several hours before Hamas’s October 7, 2023, massacre that an invasion by the terror group was likely but did not alert him.

“This is a fact and not a conspiracy,” a statement from the premier’s office read, asserting that at 4:30 that morning, “it was already clear to the outgoing Shin Bet head that an invasion of the State of Israel was likely.”

The statement went on to ask: “Why at that moment did he not wake up the prime minister? Why didn’t he warn the community heads in the Gaza periphery? Why was the prime minister’s military secretary only updated minutes before the start of the attack?”

The statement repeated a narrative that an “Israeli official” — who Channel 12 identified as the prime minister himself — peddled to media outlets last week as the cabinet sat down to fire Bar.

Critics of the prime minister have accused him of seeking to fire Bar due to an ongoing Shin Bet probe of alleged ties between Netanyahu’s top aides and Qatar, which backs Hamas. Bar himself, in a letter to the cabinet this month, said that he issued “countless warnings to the political echelon” ahead of the October 7 massacre, and said Netanyahu’s purported reasons for firing him include “baseless claims, serving only as a cover for entirely different, improper motives.”

Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara, whom the government is also working to dismiss, warned that the ouster faced legal difficulties, in part due to the ongoing Shin Bet probe of Netanyahu’s aides.

Bar vowed to stay on as Shin Bet chief until the return of all hostages from Gaza and the formation of a state commission of inquiry into the Hamas onslaught, which the government staunchly opposes.

The court has scheduled an April 8 hearing on the petitions against his firing.

Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.