Israel’s AG Won’t Release Bibi Tapes During Investigation
Image by getty images
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Israel’s Attorney General Avichai Mandleblit said that releasing recordings of conversations between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Yediot Acharonot publisher Arnon Mozes could obstruct the current police investigation into possible corruption.
Mandleblit said during a speech Monday at the Netanya Academic College that he would consider releasing the tapes at a later date, however, due to their public significance.
Netanyahu is currently under investigation in two separate cases, one in which he allegedly received gifts worth hundreds of thousands of shekels from wealthy businessmen which he says were gifts from friends, and one in which he and Mozes discussed a deal in which the Netanyahu would receive favorable coverage in Yediot in exchange for legislation that would cut the circulation of the free Hebrew-language daily Yisrael Hayom.
Excerpts of the tapes have been aired daily since last week by Israel’s Channel 2. The tapes were discovered during an investigation into former Netanyahu chief of staff Ari Harow.
Netanyahu slammed the investigation late Sunday in a Facebook post, which he called: “A media campaign, unprecedented in scope, orchestrated to overthrow the Likud-led government which I head.” The campaign, he said, is designed “to pressure the attorney general and the police into indicting me for no reason.” He added that “as long as the investigation continues, I can’t defend myself. I can’t tell the public the real story behind the tapes” that shows that there was no wrongdoing.”
“I intend to continue leading the country,” he also said.
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.
If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.
Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
