Likud tribunal rejects petitions to expel ex-defense minister Yoav Gallant

The internal tribunal Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party on Sunday unanimously rejected petitions to expel former defense minister Yoav Gallant from the party.

While the tribunal sharply criticized Gallant’s conduct, including his opposition to the Likud-led overhaul of the judiciary and attempts to legislate draft exemptions for yeshiva students, it found no constitutional grounds for expelling him from the party, according to Hebrew media reports.

Gallant, a veteran Likud member, responded by calling the petitions an “attempted political assassination” and panned the lawmakers behind them as not embracing the party’s ideology.

Netanyahu fired Gallant in the middle of the war in Gaza over policy disagreements, and the former minister has continued to harshly criticize the premier since.

The petitions, filed by Likud members and backed by the party’s legal adviser, accused Gallant of violating party principles, obstructing government policies, and aiding the opposition.

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The tribunal rejected those claims, arguing that there was insufficient evidence to support them. It noted that a lawmaker’s duty is ultimately to the state rather than the party, and that any judgment on whether Gallant acted out of genuine concern for the national interest should be left to voters, not party judges.

The judges also warned against using allegations of disloyalty to the party to settle internal political scores, noting the irony that the petitioners were asking the tribunal to intervene in areas in which Likud has long argued courts should not.

Israel is to hold national elections no later than October this year.

Gallant, in response to the decision, wrote on X that the tribunal had reached “the only decision that enables it to be a legitimate institute.”

He said the effort to push him out was “an attempted political assassination” based on “gross lies.”

“The verdict clearly stresses: The direction of a significant part of the party representatives in the Knesset, and their support for mass dodging of IDF draft is devoid of Likud values.”

Gallant resigned from the Knesset in January 2025, several months after Netanyahu fired him — for a second time — from his cabinet post. In March, he ruled out running in the upcoming elections set for October. The petitions against him had been filed earlier.

A former general, Gallant was defense minister on the day of the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, onslaught, and led the security establishment during the first year of Israel’s war in Gaza and conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon. He has taken responsibility for his part in failing to stop the shock attack, unlike Netanyahu and other senior ministers.

He was removed from his post by Netanyahu in November 2024 as their relationship grew increasingly acrimonious.

The premier said he fired Gallant due to a lack of mutual trust. The former defense minister has said he was sacked over his insistence that ultra-Orthodox men be drafted to mandatory military service, that the government strike a hostage deal with Hamas, and that a state commission of inquiry be opened into the October 7 attack.

It was the second time the premier had moved to fire him. The two had clashed prior to October 7, when Gallant warned that the government’s controversial judicial overhaul agenda was creating a national rift that made the country less safe. In that instance, Netanyahu reversed the decision amid intense public protest.

Gallant resigned from the Knesset in January 2025, several months after Netanyahu fired him from his cabinet post for the second time. Likud later launched proceedings to expel Gallant from its ranks.

Last month, the ex-minister called Netanyahu “a liar” and accused him of creating a false narrative surrounding the October 7 attack in order to evade responsibility.