FirstFrom a moral standpoint, this act by Maj. Gen. Goffman is the complete opposite of the abdication of responsibility attributed to him by the petitioners. Immediately after the person whose actions he was directly responsible, Major Tzur, was questioned in the affair, Maj. Gen. Goffman unequivocally took full responsibility for his actions, and made it clear that they were carried out with his approval. If the test that must be set for the values of the head of an Mossad is his willingness to take responsibility for his subordinates, this conduct is in favor of Maj. Gen. Goffman, and indicates the opposite of the failure that the petitioners wish to attribute to him.
Second, Maj. Gen. Goffman paid a personal price for taking on this responsibility, and he knew that he would pay this price. The operation of Mr. Almakais by the 210th Division was carried out in violation of the procedures, and without the necessary permits. Maj. Gen. Goffman testified that he understood this, and in any case knew that taking responsibility was likely to lead to some kind of action being taken against him. And indeed, it was. According to the MAG instructions, Maj. Gen. Goffman was summoned to a disciplinary proceeding before the then commander of the Northern Command, at the end of which he received a command note, after the commander of the Northern Command was convinced that Maj. Gen. Goffman did not know that it was the operation of a minor, and that he had instructed not to pass on classified information to Mr. Almakais.
Third, from the material before us, it appears that the summary of Maj. Tzur's investigation at the IOMB was not forwarded to the State Attorney's Office officials who dealt with the indictment against Mr. Almakais shortly after it was signed (August 15, 2022), but only more than a year later, and as a result, the fact that Maj. Gen. Goffman assumed responsibility for Mr. Almakais' operation by the 210th Division became known to the State Attorney's Office officials only at a later stage (probably in late 2023, and shortly after the indictment was canceled). Compare: Section 2 of the notice of cancellation of the indictment dated December 14, 2023, which was attached as Appendix 2 to Almakais' petition and sections 8-9 of the census update). This fact certainly cannot be attributed to Maj. Gen. Goffman. Moreover, given that the indictment did not deal at all with the information exchanged in the framework of the relationship between the 210th Division and Mr. Almakayes, I find it difficult to see how what was stated in the summary of the investigation of the IAB has an impact on the conduct of the criminal proceedings against Mr. Almakayes. However, since the issue of the cancellation of the indictment against Mr. Almakais was not before us, I will refrain from making any comments on this issue.
- The period prior to August 10, 2022: Beyond the arguments relating to the clarification call (which were examined in the framework of the discussion on the issue of lying above), there is no claim that Maj. Goffman, or any other party in the 210th Division, should have acted in the case of Mr. Almakais before he was arrested on May 24, 2022. According to the claim, Major Tzur understood at some point from media reports, and from the fact that Mr. Almakais did not respond to his inquiries, that Mr. Almakais had been arrested, and informed Maj. Gen. Goffman about this (see: Major Tzur's second statement to the committee, at p. 5). See also: ibid., at p. 6 and in Major Tzur's first statement to the committee, at pp. 6-7). From that point on, Mr. Almakais believes that Maj. Gen. Goffman should have acted on his behalf, contacted the investigative authorities or the Communications Operations Department as soon as possible on his own initiative, and made them aware of the fact that the 210th Division had activated Mr. Almakais. Had he done so, the investigation against him would have been conducted differently, the indictment would not have been filed (on June 13, 2022), and the entire unfortunate affair would have been avoided (see: paragraphs 49-50 of the petitioners' supplementary response to the Elmakais petition and paragraph 145 of the Elmakais petition). Indeed, it is a harsh narrative that paints General Goffman's conduct in black. Presenting things in this way is completely detached from the facts.
I will examine the matter from two perspectives: in accordance with the information that has been placed before the committee and before us at the present time; and in accordance with the information that Major General Goffman had in real time.
- First, I will examine General Goffman's conduct from our point of view today. How did his behavior affect the interrogation of Mr. Almakais in reality? In other words, could Maj. Goffman have prevented the filing of the indictment against Mr. Almakais on June 13, 2022, or cut off the legal proceedings against Mr. Almakais in its initial stages? It is clear to me that the answer to this is no. The indictment against Mr. Almakais does not include any reference to Major Tzur or the information he passed on to Mr. Almakais (not even to Mr. Almakais himself). Therefore, if Maj. Gen. Goffman had informed the investigative authorities that he had given Major Tzur permission in principle to pass on unclassified information to Mr. Almakais, this should not have undermined the thesis presented in the indictment. At most, it can be assumed that this would have delayed the legal proceedings against Mr. Almakais to some extent, due to the need to ascertain the scope of the operation by the 210th Division, and whether there is a connection between this operation and the other details of the information that was provided to him. In any event, the information that Maj. Gen. Goffman should have provided was not relevant to the main purpose of the investigation - to trace the leak of information from Intelligence Directorate officials (see paragraphs 77-81 above). In fact, there is a strong indication for this hypothesis. During the interrogation, it became clear that there was a discrepancy between the various reports regarding the authorization given to Major Tzur's activity, and yet he was not summoned for interrogation or testimony in order to clarify the matter (ISA interrogation records, at pp. 18-19). The reason for this, as clarified, was that the connection between him and Mr. Almakais had nothing to do with the leak of the information that the investigation was dealing with. Accordingly, a few days later, the indictment was filed against Mr. Almakais.
Specifically, the preliminary inquiry was intended to map Mr. Almakais's ties with the IDF, in order to rule out the possibility that the leak of the discovered information was in the framework of an approved operation. The discovery of an approved operation would have required an examination of whether the confidential information was provided as part of this operation, and would not have justified the automatic closure of the investigation. Such an examination would have revealed (as it turned out in the security and criminal investigation in any case) that the leak of the information being investigated had nothing to do with Division 210, and in any case did not stem from Mr. Almakays's operation. The obvious conclusion is that even if the ISA interrogators had known in advance following the investigation that was conducted that the operation of Mr. Almakais by Major Tzur was an approved operation, this fact would not have prevented the interrogation of Mr. Almakais and the subsequent filing of the indictment against him.