Netanyahu leaving court this week
It all began with a lot of noise. The main headlines in the Israeli press discussed the central charge against Prime Minister Netanyahu who is accused of having accepted bribery through seeking to get favorable press coverage — just like every politician before him and since. According to the prosecution, Netanyahu did favors for businessman Shaul Alowitz, a key man in the Bezeq combine, in exchange for a positive coverage in the press.
Let us review that Netanyahu is being accused of three offenses: breach of trust in Case 1000 (the case of gifts); and the same thing in Case 2000 (Yediot Acharonot - Nuni Moses). It is Case 4000, which has the most serious charge — bribery (in addition to breach of trust). The entire excuse and justification for bringing charges against a sitting prime minister (when the charges were first brought and again now) was the accusation of bribery. The other charges are all vague laws and not really serious crimes.
Netanyahu's original reaction was: "Nothing will come of this because nothing [criminal] happened."
Note that the chareidim have consistently supported Netanyahu, even though we do not regard him in any way as our leader.
Regarding the last charge, from the very outset many judicial experts believed that it would be very difficult to accuse a public figure of bribery on the basis him seeking favorable press coverage, that charging him this was involved a selective enforcement against the prime minister, and the production of a clause that was tailored precisely to charge him.
So what did we have in the prime minister's cases before the collapse of Case 4000?
When the saga of the cases against Netanyahu began over five years ago, Yediot Acharonot splashed in its main headlines, in bold and red, that the police advised putting up Netanyahu to trial in both Case 1000 and Case 2000, for bribery.
Ma'ariv reported: "The tower has collapsed on Netanyahu's head, and the panels are made of reinforced concrete." Ha'aretz reported that according to the police, "there is proof that Netanyahu accepted bribery in two cases, and acted accordingly, against the interests of the State."
Subsequently, the police and the prosecution supplied dramatic and pompous headlines about the charges against Netanyahu. Thus, for example, the former police chief, Roni Alshich, said that he "has difficulty in seeing any possibility where Netanyahu would not be charged with bribery." Later on, he declared that he is "familiar with every single word in the files against him."
The latest development in Case 4000 comes, at least according to appearances, after the testimony of the Opposition Leader Yair Lapid, who testified before the court about the relations between politicians and businessmen. In spite of the fact that Lapid's testimony focused on the case against the gifts (1000), it presented to the court the well-known fact regarding money and government.
Analysts opined that it was primarily Lapid's testimony which was meant to strengthen the prosecution's position in the Netanyahu case, but instead clearly worked against its interests, demonstrating the weakness of several main charges in the case against the Prime Minister.
The writing on the wall was evident all along. Whoever followed the course of the trial could not help but seeing the warning signals erected before the prosecution throughout, indicating that they were presenting a weak case which would eventually disintegrate.
