Barak Ravid Netanyahu bars Mossad head from briefing opposition party on ISIS :

Netanyahu bars Mossad head from briefing opposition party on ISIS

Tamir Pardo reportedly agreed to brief Zionist Union, but conditioned talk on PM's approval, which wasn't forthcoming.

HAARETZ.COM|Di Barak Ravid

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has forbidden the head of the Mossad to brief Zionist Union Knesset members on the threat posed by ISIS (Islamic State) in the Sinai Peninsula.
Zionist Union faction chairwoman Merav Michaeli, who submitted the request, said Netanyahu claimed such a briefing would set a precedent, and therefore, he didn’t want to approve it.
Michaeli told Haaretz that the faction decided it needed more information about ISIS in light of three recent events: last week’s attack on Egyptian security forces by the organization’s Sinai affiliate, Wilayat Sinai; the group’s rocket fire at southern Israel over the weekend; and the statement by former CIA director David Petraeus that ISIS is currently a bigger threat than Iran.
On Sunday, therefore, she asked Mossad director Tamir Pardo if he would attend Zionist Union’s faction meeting in the Knesset on Monday and brief the MKs on the threat that ISIS’s presence in Sinai poses to Israel. Michaeli said Pardo “agreed gladly,” but stipulated that he needed the prime minister’s approval.
Michaeli then asked a Netanyahu adviser to forward the faction’s request to the prime minister. On Monday morning, the adviser got back to Michaeli and said that Netanyahu wouldn’t permit Pardo to give the briefing.
“The prime minister believes this would set a problematic precedent,” the adviser told her. “Now, every party will seek such briefings from the Mossad director.”
But Michaeli contested this claim, arguing that since Zionist Union is the leader of the opposition, a briefing for its MKs couldn’t be used as a precedent by other parties.
“Not every member of Zionist Union’s faction sits on the [Knesset] Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee,” where Pardo routinely gives briefings, Michaeli noted. “Nor is this the same kind of briefing. Moreover, one presumes the Mossad director knows what he can say in every forum.”
She also pointed out that over a year ago, Pardo briefed leading corporate executives with the prime minister’s consent. “If it’s possible to give them a briefing, is it impossible to give one to Zionist Union’s Knesset members?” she asked the prime minister’s adviser.
The adviser replied that the request would be put to Netanyahu again, but later came back with the same answer. “The Mossad director didn’t receive permission to meet with the business leaders and was even reprimanded for this,” the adviser added.
The Mossad briefing that the PM regrets
At his July 2014 briefing for business leaders, which was first reported in Haaretz, Pardo said the conflict with the Palestinians is a greater threat to Israel than Iran’s nuclear program. Several weeks afterward, in response to a query from the Movement for Quality Government in Israel, the prime minister’s bureau said the briefing was “a one-time occurrence, and in retrospect, it shouldn’t have happened.”
Sources in the Prime Minister’s Office said Monday night it was contrary to accepted practice for defense officials to meet with either coalition or opposition factions. “The heads of the defense agencies brief Knesset members regularly in the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee and its subcommittees,” the office added in a statement.
But Michaeli was unconvinced. “Netanyahu is wrong to think that senior civil servants are his personal advisers and work for him,” she said. “In Israel, they are public servants, and it’s completely unreasonable and inappropriate to prevent them from speaking to the public’s elected representatives.”