Education Minister Naftali Bennett publicly criticized Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon on Tuesday for their “passivity” in dealing with Israel’s threats, but in private conversations obtained by Channel 10 the minister is even more blunt. 

“Bogie is a failed defense minister,” Bennett is heard telling associates. “He would be an excellent director-general of the Defense Ministry, but the role of minister is to cast into question and challenge the system, not just manage it.” 

“Bogie immobilizes the defense apparatus and Bibi flows along with him,” the Jewish Home chairman charges. 

Earlier Tuesday, at the Institute for National Security Studies conference in Tel Aviv, Bennett called to re-examine Israel’s security policy.

“Instead of purchasing more planes, instead of doing the same thing again and expecting different results – we must come up with a new plan, to test our basic assumptions on every front, and to identify the changes that will take us to a new path,” he stressed.

The estimation among political analysts is that Bennett’s remarks at the INSS conference as well as the leaked private conversations were by no means accidental. 

Channel 10 reports that sources in the Education Ministry have confirmed Bennett is trying to present himself an alternative in the Right after Netanyahu’s term as premier is up. 

Ya’alon, meanwhile, did not take the criticism sitting down and without saying his name directly, attacked Bennett for stealing ideas discussed in Cabinet meetings and shooting them out “irresponsibly.”

“Policies are not managed with slogans,” he blasted. “This is a culture of bad government; it has to stop.”