The Prime Minister`s Office Engagement with the Coordinator for Captives and Missing Persons

​Background

The captives and missing persons are a complicated issue that has been a cause for concern in Israel for decades. Addressing this issue involves, among other things, collecting information, managing contacts at the international level for achieving arrangements for the return of the captives and the missing persons, and keeping close contact with their families which are in a challenging period of an ongoing crisis. The Prime Minister's Office handles the captives and missing persons, and the Prime Minister is directly responsible for it. The Prime Minister's Office manages its activities regarding the captives and missing persons, also through the Captives and Missing Persons Coordinator (the Coordinator), who acts on behalf of the Prime Minister. The following figure presents some of the captives and missing persons' cases (both soldiers and civilians) for about 40 years since the beginning of the first Lebanon War in 1982. 

Audit Actions

From April to August 2022, the State Comptroller Office examined the engagement with the Captives and Missing Persons Coordinator. The audit included: addressing the recommendations of the committee for setting negotiating principles for captives' release headed by the former president of the Supreme Court, Meir Shamgar (the Shamgar Committee); defining the Coordinator's role, the expected outcomes, planning of his work, implementing work plans and reporting implementation; managing communication with families of captives and missing persons; managing information accumulated at the Prime Minister's Office; the Coordinator's engagement contract and payment for his work. This report does not deal with military-diplomatic actions and negotiations to form arrangements for the return of the captives and missing persons. The audit was conducted in the Prime Minister's Office, including the office of the Prime Minister's Military Secretary and the National Security Council. Supplementary audits were conducted in the IDF, the General Security Service, and the Israeli Secret Intelligence Service (Mossad). 

This report was submitted to the Prime Minister on January 3rd, 2023, and confidentiality was imposed. 

Under the authority vested upon the State Comptroller's Office by Section 17(c) of the State Comptroller Law 1958 [Consolidated Version], considering the government's arguments, consulting with the bodies in charge of the protection of national security information, coordination with the Chairman of the Knesset, and since the stated subcommittee failed to convene, it was decided to publish this report while imposing confidentiality on parts of it. These sections shall not be submitted to the Knesset, nor shall they be published.

The findings of the audit report and its recommendations are valid as of the above date of its presentation.

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Summary

Contending with captives and missing persons throughout the years requires regulation of the activities also concerning the activities management on behalf of the prime minister or the government. In 2012, the Shamgar Committee pointed out some gaps in how the government addressed it. A decade has passed, and the government, the Minister of Defense who appointed the Committee or the Prime Minister's Office is in charge of the issue have made no decisions related to the Committee's recommendations. It is recommended that the Prime Minister's Office form a format for handling the captives and missing persons, determine the responsibilities and powers of the Coordinator, form a work plan including tasks, metrics, and timetable, and supervise the plan's implementation. It is further recommended that the Prime Minister's Office form the communication format between the Coordinator and the families of captives and missing persons, including the minimal frequency of meeting with them and the person authorized to decide which information is presented to them.