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The charge of breach of trust appears invulnerable, the charge of bribery is swaying: an interim summary of an object testimony

Hefetz's testimony dramatically strengthens the accusation against Netanyahu of breach of trust.

The question of whether he will be convicted of bribery does not depend on a single evidence, but on the worldview of the judges: whether the mass provided by an object and brought by the other witnesses will suffice for a conviction for bribery.

And why are the celebrations of Netanyahu's supporters puzzling in the context of breach of trust?

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Friday, 26 November 2021, 15:53

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In the video: Nir Hefetz on the witness stand in the 4000 case (Walla system!)

About two weeks ago I wrote here that after the testimony of Nir Hefetz we will be able to assess for the first time the condition of Benjamin Netanyahu in the 4000 case. So Hefetz's testimony did not end;

On Monday, the phase of his main testimony in the 4000 case will end.

The second insight - Netanyahu's charge of bribery is still very volatile, and very much depends on how the judges see the mass of circumstances before them.

More on Walla!

Hefetz testifies about the video "The Arabs are flocking" in court: "Netanyahu was nervous, salvation was mobilized"

To the full article

More on Walla!

• Hefetz in court: No editor has been appointed for Walla!

  Without permission from Netanyahu

• Hefetz testified: "I handed Netanyahu a document from Elowitz. He read, grumbled and asked to make an appointment."

• Everything you need to know about the B-Cure laser device for pain management

Object in court, this week (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Any possible outcome.

To be fair, I say right now that the first insight does not reconcile with an interpretive assessment I had on the eve of Mandelblit's decision to file this indictment.

So I thought, as some senior Justice Department officials thought, that the 4000 case is either bribery or nothing and that the option of conviction only for breach of trust is unreasonable.

Today it is already clear that this assumption was incorrect and immediately the explanation.

Breach of trust

The previous assumption that the 4000 case is either a bribe or nothing, stemmed from the thought that if one were to go for this criminal concept that the benefit to Netanyahu was a journalist, it would be a bit ridiculous to build this criminal thesis on the construction of the breach of trust offense.

The thought was that, in the first place, being content with this offense, the easier one, would actually be seen as an unnecessary treatment of Netanyahu.

Conflict of interest in the context of press coverage?

It is well known that politicians court publishers and vice versa; Netanyahu did not invent it.

The assumption was that if you examine such relationships between publishers and politicians you will effortlessly find countless breaches of trust from such, so the position was that if you do not have a set of evidence that proves real bribery in this context, you should get off the whole story. Truth, with a clear and tangible awareness of give and take. Breach of trust alone, so I thought (and as mentioned not only me) is not appropriate for such a case, and therefore either bribery or genizah.

Hefetz's description of Netanyahu's involvement in media affairs is a psychic description of an obsessive politician in this field. Hefetz really does not help defend the thesis that this is a "legitimate spokeswoman," and as a former journalist and veteran media man, who was in contact with powerful people (such as Nochi Dankner and Noni Mozes), states in his testimony that he never encountered intense media like Netanyahu. Hefetz testified that the prime minister's involvement in the issue was almost as intense as security. The truth is that Hefetz should not make an effort to prove it, it is enough that Netanyahu was the first prime minister in history to decide as a policy to keep his communications portfolio with him. All this is of course not criminal, but it is the infrastructure for what happens next:

Hefetz describes in detail how he transfers desires and desires from Netanyahu's bureau to Alovich and vice versa.

The messages are disturbed.

He testifies that before the government was formed in 2015, Elovich handed him a list of preferred candidates for the position, with Netanyahu at the top of the list.

Elovich's interest was clear to Netanyahu, and it is also clear that Hefetz conveyed to Netanyahu the spirit of his talks with Elovich.

All this not only did not cause Netanyahu to exclude himself from engaging in Elovich's interests, but he promoted them and more.

Desires and desires from Netanyahu's office.

An object at the end of his testimony, this week (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Moreover, Hefetz testified that "in 2014, when I returned to work with Netanyahu, he instructed me to contact and meet Elovich, and that he would be the only and exclusive contact person to convey his messages on media issues related to the Walla!" Website. Well, such a direct instruction, when Netanyahu knows the messages that Elowitz is trying to convey to him, is in itself seen as a criminal breach of trust. As for the transfer of instructions, Hefetz fully strengthens Ilan Yeshua's testimony that the latter did not act independently and as part of his desire to please others (which the defense commissioned in his cross-examination to prove), but following Hefetz's assumptions, directly from Balfour. Moreover, contrary to the defense's position that most of the demands came from Ms. Sarah Netanyahu and Ben Yair, Hefetz in this matter is unequivocal, that all the demands and all requests were transferred to him directly from Netanyahu, and he is the one who transferred them to the Walla !. "I received my instructions from only one person," Hefetz emphasized, "Benjamin Netanyahu. I would not have been allowed to move an inch without him."

Hefetz explicitly describes that Elovich "courted" him in order to convey messages to Netanyahu regarding the Bezeq-Yas deal. Hefetz described a meeting by the pool at Elovich's house, in which the latter handed him documents and asked to pass them on to Netanyahu: He says that he handed the documents to Netanyahu in his office and after reading them carefully, Netanyahu shredded them and asked his secretary to schedule a meeting with Elovich.

The meeting described by Hefetz was mysterious, when at Netanyahu's request he put Alovich into Balfour without being recognized by anyone who was there, and while he, Hefetz, was draping the curtains of the room where the meeting took place. Hefetz sums up his control of Walla! At that time simply: "On the Walla! Website, our highest level was to control what would be on the homepage (home page), and what would be the title ... Elovich's response was absolute to every request. The question was how to do it and not if to do it." Moreover, Hefetz explained, "the rule was that Shaul and Iris Elovich do not appoint a senior editor without the approval of the prime minister and his wife."

Hefetz describes that one of the highlights of this distorted relationship was Netanyahu's interview with Dov Gilhar on the eve of the 2015 elections. He says that the editorial material was sent to Balfour and edited by Netanyahu and Hefetz themselves.

"I wrote down from what second to what second he wants to cut out passages that hurt him. I passed instructions that Benjamin Netanyahu gave me. I have never encountered this in my career," Hefetz said.

Well, anyone who tries to sell you that this is how a publisher and a politician are regularly treated is a liar; yes, there have been terrible distortions in the Israeli media (we learned a lot about this in the Moses-Netanyahu recordings in the 2000 case), but such blatantness So, as long as it does not crack significantly in the cross-examination, it looks criminal.Is it criminal to the point of bribery? This is already a more complex question.

bribe

We already understand that an object does not provide a golden vision of Netanyahu's mental element. He has never heard him link the benefits he receives from Elowitz to what he does for him, so that Netanyahu can seemingly justify any such action (promoting a Bezeq-Yis merger on the one hand, and attempting to influence the site's content on the other, as a legitimate act as long as there is no connection I depend on them). Those who do link the things are the family members, like Yair Netanyahu who clearly links what his father does for Elowitz, and what Elowitz does (or does not do enough according to Yair) for Netanyahu.

But the judges made it clear to the prosecution team this week that he will not shine, and neither Ms. Netanyahu are the defendants in this case.

Moreover, they will also not testify at trial.

The importance of the judges' comments should not be underestimated.

The judges' comments make clear how difficult Netanyahu's conviction for bribery will be.

Hefetz, it will be recalled, also clarified to the State Attorney's Office in refreshing the testimony that contrary to what was stated in the indictment (section 83), he did not receive a direct instruction from Netanyahu to convey a message to Pilber in the regulatory areas related to Elowitz.

By the way, this refresher does not contradict Hefetz's testimony to the police in this matter, since he did not explicitly say what is written in the indictment.

The State Attorney's Office in this matter relied more on the testimony of the second state witness, Shlomo Pilber.

Netanyahu in the debate.

This week (Photo: Official website, Oren Ben Hakon)

What, after all, is the chance for Netanyahu's conviction for bribery, after the prosecution's announcement regarding section 83, after the judges' comments regarding the separation between Netanyahu and his family, and after the main testimony in 4000, which probably will not include a golden statement on Netanyahu's mental element? It is of course too early to answer this question, as it depends entirely on the legal perception of each of the judges: will they see in the mass of circumstances - messages from Elowitz, Elowitz's dependence on Netanyahu at the time, and extreme involvement (even in site appointments), her Netanyahu must have been aware; Transfer of the document and its shredding, a meeting with Elovich at the moment of truth in Balfour; And of course, Netanyahu's intensive and rapid activity in the Ministry of Communications, which in practice fulfilled Elowitz's interests - as such that leaves no room for a reasonable doubt that the relationship between Elowitz and Netanyahu was a bribery relationship? This is definitely a possibility and it depends mainly on a judge's worldview.

For example, in contrast, the justice of the peace who acquitted retired superintendent Nisso Shaham thought that the mass of events did not necessarily produce a criminal charge (where it is indeed a breach of trust offense), while the district and Supreme Court justices (except in a minority opinion) thought the opposite.

A criminal trial in the end, even if we wanted to think differently, is not an exact science, so the relevant term for a person's criminal conviction is that his guilt should be proven above all "reasonable doubt."

If it was an exact science, the phrase would have been "beyond doubt."

The word "reasonable" is precisely the judge's discretion.

Out-of-court demonstrations, this week (Photo: TPS, Shalev Amsalem)

There is a false and deliberate impression that Netanyahu's conviction for breach of trust in the 4000 case will constitute proof of Netanyahu's thesis of persecution, since without the "bribery" clause, Netanyahu would have won each of the last four election campaigns.

This is a false and historically unfounded thesis.

As will be recalled, Olmert in the Talansky-Rashontours case is accused "only" of breach of trust and the country erupted (among other things, the current defendant became a criminal);

His coalition partners threatened to overthrow the government, and he eventually announced his own resignation.

In addition, we will mention that only for this case did Olmert receive 8 months' actual imprisonment.

Assuming the 4000 case contains a breach of trust conviction, it may be one of two or three convictions (1,000, 2,000, 4,000);

So even if Netanyahu's supporters' assessment that there is no chance that Netanyahu will be convicted of bribery is correct (and as mentioned, it is too early), there is no point in celebrations, certainly not now.

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