BICOM

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last night that he should be allowed to confront the state’s witnesses in the three corruption cases against him.

Netanyahu delivered a speech live at 8pm. Earlier in the afternoon it was announced that Netanyahu would make a “dramatic announcement” in a live broadcast. Netanyahu said the face-to-face meetings should be broadcast live, so that the Israeli public could see and hear him challenge all the accusations against him. Netanyahu said he had already twice requested the opportunity to question the three state’s witnesses – Ari Harow, Shlomo Filber and Nir Hefetz – but had been rebuffed on both occasions by investigators.

“Why did they refuse to allow me that confrontation, which is so essential to discovering the truth? What are they afraid of? What have they got to hide? I’m not afraid. I’ve got nothing to hide,” he added.

Speaking specifically about Case 4,000, in which Netanyahu allegedly approved regulations to benefit Shaul Elovitch, the controlling shareholder in telecoms company Bezeq, in exchange for positive media coverage from Elovitch’s Walla news website, Netanyahu said: “I’ve heard that they didn’t summon the most important regulator in Case 4,000—the director of the Antitrust Authority, Dr. Assaf Eilat. If that’s true, why didn’t they summon him? Maybe because the people at the Antitrust Authority told the media that the decision about the Bezeq-Yes merger was made without any intervention by me or by anyone on my behalf.”

The Ministry of Justice said in a statement that the investigation of Netanyahu had been conducted entirely professionally with the oversight of the Tel Aviv District Attorney’s Office’s tax and economic department and under the supervision of the state attorney and the attorney general.

Netanyahu’s televised speech was immediately condemned by Labour party leader, Avi Gabbay who said: “In a normal country, a prime minister does not behave this way. In a normal country, the prime minister does not attack the law enforcement authorities.”

Benny Gantz’s new party, the Israel Resilience Party, issued a statement that called for a “leadership that is about the citizens of the country and not about itself”.