Published: 19 February 2019
Last updated: 4 March 2024
IF AN INDICTMENT is filed in the coming weeks against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, it won’t be the first time a sitting Israeli prime minister has become embroiled in criminal proceedings.
But of the cases pending against Netanyahu, Case 2000 – the affair involving a suspected illicit quid pro quo deal between him and Yedioth Ahronoth publisher Arnon "Noni" Mozes, in which the prime minister allegedly wanted to weaken the rival Israel Hayom paper in return for favourable coverage in Mozes’ paper – poses the greatest harm to the public interest. Therefore, this case is precedent-setting.
Without diminishing the seriousness of the suspicions in the other cases, with Case 2000 the attorney general has been given the opportunity and the responsibility to thoroughly uproot the ingrained institutionalised corruption underlying media-politics relations in Israel. Of all the cases involving the prime minister, this one is the game-changer.
FULL STORY This Netanyahu corruption case is the gravest threat to Israel’s democracy (Haaretz)
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Photo: Benjamin Netanyahu and Yedioth Ahronoth publisher Arnon (Noni) Mozes (Atef Safadi/AP and Moti Kimche)