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The show must stop: In the midst of the election bustle, Netanyahu's trial is almost forgotten
The questions to the candidates regarding the coalition puzzle have replaced the requirements for answering it with ideological issues and methods of action.
And while the public discourse deals with the political tangle, the evidentiary stage in the prime minister's trial is approaching by leaps and bounds.
And also: the main message that comes out of the prosecutor's decision in the rape case in the hotel
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Tel Aviv District Attorney's Office
Fellow Isman
Faina Kirschenbaum
Daniel Dolev
Friday, 26 March 2021, 22:00 Updated: 22:05
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The day before yesterday, about 15 hours after the polls closed, I spoke to a media person on one of the new systems.
The results that flowed showed that for the fourth time in two years no decision had been reached, and my interlocutor showed advanced signs of despair.
What depressed him was not the huge waste of public money on a fifth election campaign, nor the fact that there is no functioning government in Israel for who knows how long - but rather the media coverage.
"Look," he told me, pointing to one of the sites that just interviewed this or that list leader, "all you ask is whether or not he'll sit with that one. There's not a single milligram of essence here."
Well, that media man was right, but also wrong.
He was right because there is really very little substance in the media coverage of the election.
There is no more importance to an ideological platform, or even to deeds, and evidently many parties have stopped publishing a platform, and many politicians have stopped doing so.
The question "what would you do if you were in the coalition" was long ago replaced by the question of who would be willing to sit in the coalition.
In an endless election campaign, the fact was forgotten that during the normal course of political life, after the campaign someone is elected and has to run the country.
for further reading
After public criticism: Yarin Sharaf will be charged with raping the girl at the Corona Hotel
The Yisrael Beiteinu affair: Former Deputy Minister Faina Kirschenbaum was convicted of bribery
Former Foreign Ministry official wins bribe.
Judge: A shameful and frightening investigation
This way you will overcome pain in the hip joint and avoid surgery
Trial during contacts for the formation of the government.
Netanyahu (Photo: Reuven Castro)
But the same journalist was also wrong, because in this context the media is really doing its job faithfully - it reflects reality.
And the reality is that Israel has been dragged into four election campaigns because Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tries to shuffle the cards over and over again until he can pull out the right hand to pull him out of his criminal process.
And since governments do not stand on this very personal basis, the most relevant question at the top of a list is "Would you be willing to sit in a coalition whose only reason for existence is to extricate the prime minister from trial?".
Meanwhile, in the tumult of the counting of votes, it is almost forgotten that in 10 days the evidentiary phase of the trial is due to open.
This is a significant milestone where the trial is gearing up.
Instead of a discussion once every two months, move on to three discussions a week.
Instead of arguing over another quarter of a document and a half cetals of investigative material, we get the main dish: the witnesses who will tell in their own words what exactly happened on the Walla!
And in the Ministry of Communications in a period known today simply as the "4000 case."
Netanyahu and his defense attorneys did everything they could to prevent this day from coming before the election, and they succeeded.
But now, if there are no further postponements, he will arrive at the time of the talks to form the government.
The first witness, former Walla CEO Ilan Yeshua, will appear to tell in his voice how the Walla! Website was created for the benefit of the Prime Minister.
Prosecution in Mania-Depression
The economic department of the State Attorney's Office has been manic-depressive in the past month.
Two weeks ago, attorneys received scathing criticism from the Jerusalem District Court, which completely acquitted the former deputy accountant of the Foreign Ministry, who was charged with a series of offenses including bribery and dozens of cases of theft by a public official.
More on Walla!
The heroine of the battlefield of poverty went out to fight against the authorities.
The court came to her aid
To the full article
Successful ending chord.
Kirschenbaum in court (Photo: Flash 90, Miriam Elster)
Credits are an integral part of a plaintiff's work, and certainly not every credit is a "blow to the prosecution."
But the acquittal of Yehoshua Gabay was certainly a severe blow.
Judge Tamar Bar, who killed the management of the case - the part from accompanying the investigation, through the charges, some of which she called "puzzling", to the selection of witnesses and reliance on them.
After the depression, yesterday came the mania's turn.
The "Israel Beiteinu" case, which was undoubtedly the department's flagship case in recent years, ended in a resounding conviction of the most senior defendant - former Deputy Minister Faina Kirschenbaum.
She was convicted of accepting bribes from eight different bodies, and according to Judge Yaron Levy, she did so "systematically, cunningly and subtly for about six years."
The conviction of Kirschenbaum, as well as former Director General of the Ministry of Agriculture Rami Cohen, was a successful termination chord, for the economic department, for a case conducted over years: 18 of the defendants in a complex and ramified corruption case were convicted, and for the last defendant, the charge was dropped The case, headed by the deputy director of the department, Dr. Maor Even Chen, is commendable.
Seven years is an unbearable time.
Tel Aviv and Central District Attorney's Office (Photo: Reuven Castro)
Still, there is one point that should obscure the joy: Just as in the case of a senior Foreign Ministry official Gabay, the open investigation into the affair began in 2014, and the verdict was handed down seven years later.
Just to get an idea - the defendant who received the most severe sentence in the Yisrael Beiteinu case, David Godowski, who was convicted of taking bribes, was sentenced to six years in prison.
True, in contrast to the Gabay case, this is a particularly complex corruption case, with mountains of investigative materials, more than a hundred suspects interrogated with a warning, and four state witnesses.
And yet, seven years is an unbearable time.
The life of a person who is in criminal proceedings is stopped.
Even if he is eventually acquitted, years can pass during which he is in the status of a suspect.
What job can he get for when he is a criminal suspect?
Even if he is an individual, which bank will give a loan to a business whose owner is suspicious?
In economic offenses, for the most part, all of that person's assets are also frozen.
The conclusion is one: the justice mills in Israel are grinding too slowly, and the criminal process must undergo a thorough reform that will simplify and expedite the proceedings.
The holes and the cheese
Two weeks ago, the Tel Aviv District Attorney's Office decided to file an indictment for unlawful ground in consent against Yarin Sharaf, who allegedly raped a 13-year-old in the Corona Hotel.
Legally, some can be filed as a charge under section A or section B, and both have a reasonable chance of conviction.
Law, as they sometimes say, is not an exact science.
Different attorneys can differently evaluate the evidence and chances of conviction, and arrive at different results without one of them necessarily being wrong.
Therefore, if Isman believes that the evidence makes it possible to convict Sharaf of rape, amending the indictment was the only option for him, and it is good that he ordered to do so.
But in this case it is important to also look at the way this decision was made.
It is important to look at the way the decision is made.
Resin (Photo: Screenshot, from Facebook)
The rape case in the motel was a sensitive case with a high public profile from the first moment the affair was exposed.
Despite this, Isman was not involved at all in filing the indictment.
The state's attorney of course should not have been involved in every case, but in such an explosive case, he should at least have been informed that the indictment is not the required clause, so to speak.
The fact that he learned about it from the media is a failure in itself.
Not legal, but managerial.
The second question raised by the amendment to the indictment concerns the Tel Aviv District Attorney, Adv. Ashra Gaz. According to the State Attorney's Office's announcement today (Friday), Gaz recommended that "despite the difficulties and complexity in this case, it appears that there is a reasonable chance interest justified request to amend the indictment. "as she also recommended the head of the criminal department, attorney Rachel meters, and Deputy state Prosecutor for criminal matters, Mr. Momy Lemberger. the difference is that the last two were not receiving the initial decision.
in the discussions led by The State Attorney's Office did not add any new evidence that was not in the hands of the Tel Aviv District that examined the case, the difference being that the Tel Aviv State Attorney's Office looked at the holes, while Isman's office in Jerusalem looked at the cheese.
Managerial failure.
Isman (Photo: Official Website, University of Haifa)
The main hole they saw in the district was the pediatrician's determination that she could not determine the girl's credibility regarding the consent question.
In Isman's, they first looked at the rest of the evidence in the case, and came to the conclusion that this was a weakness in one of the pieces of evidence, not one that denies a reasonable chance of a conviction for rape.
The investigator also determined that the girl could testify in court, which in the prosecution's view would allow the judges to be impressed by her own credibility.
Eventually, the District Attorney Gas was also persuaded and recommended aggravating the indictment.
Brainstorming is excellent, and certainly one can look at evidence differently.
It is also good that the State Attorney's Office is willing to re-examine decisions if it thinks they are wrong.
The problem is that it happened after the indictment was filed, and only following public pressure.
Even if this time the result is good, it is impossible not to think that without the public echo, it is doubtful that the decision would have been reconsidered.
It is impossible not to wonder how many cases this is really what happened.
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