It was the BJP government back in 2003 when former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon paid his last visit to New Delhi. Since then, there has been a lull period in Indo-Israeli relationship. Again, the ice was broken by a BJP led government in 2014. Today, after 15 long years, India is warmly welcoming Israeli Prime Minister, Mr. Benjamin Netanyahu on hid 6 days historic visit with First Lady Mrs. Sara Netanyahu and a powerful delegation.
The warm welcome by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Mr. Benjamin Netanyahu was more than a mere reciprocation what Mr. Modi received on his recent historic visit to Israel. Salute from India to Israel was display of deep bonding and an excellent camaraderie that these two leaders share between them. Whenever, we see the two leaders together, their body language speaks volumes of a relationship that has risen over diplomacy and mutual interests.
There have been many adjectives used to describe the Indo-Israeli relationship. Many recent ones were taunting and funny. The questions were: Is it a one night stand or a long term relationship? Is it flirting, mutual interest or common enemies? So many questions were asked especially in the backdrop of India’s UNGA vote and the Spike ATGM deal.
As soon as the news of India’s UNGA vote spread, there was an unprecedented but a very heartening outcry on social media and otherwise too. Many Nationalists and Social Media users, Independent activists and experts stormed in support of Israel. There were banners by many Hindu Nationalists which read “Country – Israel , Capital – Jerusalem. This was not a symbolic gesture. It appeared to exemplify deep bonds that has developed between the people of both countries, more so in recent times. Bond that knows no compulsions, and is driven by a strong sense of belonging with each other.
India-Israel relationship is not about commercials, cosmetics or optics. The bond that has developed so largely, comes from “Destiny”. Both countries are lead by destiny and even if, we still have not totally come to terms with this unexplored fact, the signs of this belief in ‘destiny’ growing has immense potential and well, on course. It was destiny when around a 100 years ago, Haifa found a new hero in Major Dalpat Singh.
No matter how unbelievable it may sound to a rationalist mind the historical facts would keep singing this tale of valour of how a modern army weilding machine guns were run over by heroes weilding swords and lancers. This valour is still seen in our modern day defence personnel who may have a little handicap on the modern weaponary that they require but their motivation is so tall that it dwarfs such temporary handicaps.
In the India-China war in 1962, it was Israel that had helped us with 81 mm and 120 mm mortars, howitzer artillery guns with ammunition that we desperately needed. In the 1971 Indo-Pak war, Israel delayed sending back the Pakistani F-86 Sabre aircraft that were sent to Israel for maintenance. Not to forget the help Israel offered in bombing Kahuta Nuclear facility located in Pakistan in the year 1981. An indecision, that to me was the biggest blunder that lead Pakistan to flourish as Nuclear Monster that now threatens to be the hub of a Global Nuclear Catastrophe.
The modern Indo-Israel realtionship has grown from such amazing historical events and has evolved into an ever flourishing relationship that has been written by destiny itself. The future of this relationship is going to be space high. India and Israel can together bring in big breakthroughs in every field be it Space Technology, Trade and Commerce, Defence and Aerospace, Farming, Medicine and the most important of them all have been pioneers in leading the world in maintaining world peace and prosperity.
As of now there is a difference between the work cultures of both the countries and that to me is a temporary hindrance and a gift of the lackadaisical approach of the previous regimes in strengthening our functionary processes. However, with the current ruling NDA government lead by Prime Minister Shri. Narendra Modi, there is a sea of constructive reforms taking place, which has been evident to the world more as demonetisation and GST. These are the more talked about issues but there are 100s and 1000s of other such big and small steps taken by the government to evolve a work culture that is performace and deliverables driven sans any red-tapism.
However, one would like to see this relationship, from whichever spectrum deemed fit but to my eyes I see India and Israel in each others destiny and in time not just the people of both the countires but the entire world will start seeing the same.
(Communicated by the Prime Minister’s Media Adviser)
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his wife Sara, last night (Wednesday, 7 March 2018, Eastern Daylight Time), in New York, attended a Jewish Agency event to honor Natan Sharansky. Former US President George Bush was also in attendance.
Prime Minister Netanyahu:
“I believed that strong and sustained leadership in the West could win the Cold War few thought could be won. And in fact, that’s what we proceeded to do. Avital remembers this. We spoke with the administration of President Regan. I have to mention Secretary Schultz. He was magnificent, magnificent, Ambassador Jeanne Kirkpatrick and many others. And I said to them, as did others: If you press hard enough, they will crack. Not everyone believed this. I remember Yelena Bonner, the wife of Andrei Sakharov, the great Sakharov. She said to me, Sakharov will die in prison.” I said, “No, he won’t. If you press them, they will crack and they will let out Sharansky and they will let out Sakharov and they will let out 400,000 Jews.” That’s the number I said. I’m glad my prediction proved wrong, because we got more than that, twice that.
If you press them, they will crack. That same faith should guide us today, because there’s another would-be empire in the Middle East. It too oppresses its people. It too terrorizes its neighbors. But it too has a hollow core. If you press them, they will crack. They will succumb to strong pressure from the free world. And that country is Iran, and Iran’s aggression must be stopped and can be stopped. If you want to honor Natan’s legacy, then support the brave men and women of Iran who are fighting for freedom, yearning for freedom, praying for freedom and praying for our support for their struggle. That’s the best way to honor Natan’s legacy.
Natan, thank you for your service to the Jewish state and thank you for your service for the cause of freedom.”
(Communicated by the Prime Minister’s Media Adviser)
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, today (Tuesday, 6 March 2018), in Washington, addressed the AIPAC Policy Conference. Following are his remarks:
“Good morning, AIPAC. It’s always great to be here.
But as I told President Trump yesterday, it’s especially great to be in America’s capital now that he has recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
Thank you, President Trump for that historic decision. Thank you for announcing another decision—to move the American embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem this Independence Day. And the first ambassador to have the honor of working from that embassy in Jerusalem is a great American ambassador, David Friedman.
David, thank you for that terrific job that you’re doing. And you know who else is doing a fantastic job? Israel’s ambassador to Washington – Ron Dermer. Thank you for the terrific job you’re doing.
I want to thank Mort Freidman, Lillian Pinkus – Lillian, you don’t have to remind them how far back we go together – Howard Kohr, AIPAC’s nuclear core, everyone at AIPAC. I want to thank all of you for the work you are doing to strengthen the remarkable alliance between our two countries. Thank you.
I want to acknowledge the Israeli ministers, Israel’s representatives here in the United States, in the United Nations, the Mayor of Jerusalem, the many Members of Congress and the former leaders of countries who are here. In particular, I want to acknowledge my friend, a great champion of Israel, the former Prime Minister of Canada Stephen Harper. Stephen, stand up, please. Stephen, we never forget our friends, and you were a tremendous friend and still are.
And finally, I want to thank the 4,000 students who are here with us today. Four thousand students. Thank you for cutting class to be here. So, if any of you needs a note, you can see me later. There’s a line forming outside.
Now, what I can see is this. Well, it’s dark, but I can see something. I can see that the audience in this hall each year is getting bigger and bigger and bigger, 18,000 strong. I want to see all of you, and I can’t. I don’t want to stand behind this podium. Is it okay? What the heck—I’m the Prime Minister. Thank you, yeah, great, good to see you. Thank you. I’ll get there too. Don’t worry. Great to see you.
So today I want to ask you. You remember that great Clint Eastwood movie, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly? Well, I want to talk about the good, the bad and beautiful.
The good are all the good things that we are doing in Israel that are helping make the world a better place. The bad are all the bad things that malevolent forces are trying to do to Israel and to the world – and specifically, I’m talking about Iran.
And the beautiful – well, that I’ll leave to the last.
So first the good news: Israel has never been stronger militarily. Tremendously strong.
That’s an F35 fighter plane, the most advanced in the world. That’s an Iron Dome interceptor, and many other systems that we developed with the help of America. Thank you America; thank you successive American presidents; thank you Congress, Republicans and Democrats alike; thank you AIPAC for helping bring this about. You’re terrific. And this incredible military is buttressed by superb intelligence, unmatched in the world. Can you see me? I can hardly see you. I have to get closer. Yeah, I see you. That’s good. Superb intelligence. You know, in the last few years, Israel’s incredible intelligence services have foiled dozens, dozens of terrorist attacks across the world in dozens of countries. That plane, a plane like that could have been blown out of the sky if it weren’t for Israeli intelligence, a plane heading from Australia to the Persian Gulf. You’re boarding planes when you leave this place. You are safer because of Israeli intelligence. It not only protects Israeli lives, it protects innocent lives around the world.
And we’re able to do all this because of the extraordinary soldiers of the Israel Defense Forces, men and women—just look at them—men and women, black and white, religious and secular, gay and straight, Jews, Muslims, Christians, Druze, Circassians. They come from different backgrounds, but they’re united with a common mission: to protect the State of Israel. They keep us safe. They make us proud.
Now, I know there are quite a few veterans of the Israeli army here. So I want you to stand up. I want you to be recognized. Stand up please.
But the good news doesn’t stop merely with Israel’s strong military. It continues with Israel’s strong economy. It’s a tremendously strong economy, and I’ll tell you, we made it stronger by moving Israel to free market principles, which unleashed the spark of genius embedded in our people, into innovation, entrepreneurship. And there is a revolution taking place. This couldn’t happen at the better time. Look at the ten leading companies in 2006: five energy companies, one IT company, Microsoft. And a mere 10 years later, 2016, a blink of an eye in historical terms, it’s completely reversed. Five IT companies, one energy company left. The true wealth is in innovation. You know these companies: Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook. Guess what? They all have research centers in Israel. All of them, major research centers. And they’re not alone. There are hundreds more. And there’s a reason, something is going on. It’s a great change. It’s—you want to hear jargon? It’s one sentence. This is a terrible sentence, but I have no other way to say it. It’s the confluence of big data, connectivity and artificial intelligence, okay? Do you get that? You know what that does? It revolutionizes old industries and it creates entirely new industries.
So here’s an old industry that Israel was always great in: agriculture. We were always good in agriculture. But now we have precision agriculture. You know what that is? See that drone in the sky? He’s connected to a big database. And there are sensors in the field, and in the field there’s drip irrigation and drip fertilization. And now we can target, with this technology, the water that we give, the fertilizer that we give down to the individual plant that needs it. That’s precision agriculture. That’s Israel. Unbelievable.
You know, we were always good in water. I want you to see how good we are. So, we recycle almost 90% of our wastewater. The next country, with less than 20%, is Spain. You can see how Israel, what it does for water, what it does for the environment. So when you take these two things, agriculture and water, and the other technologies that we apply in both, we can change the world. We are. I just heard about an African woman in Africa, has to walk eight hours a day to give water to her children – four hours one way to a well, four hours back. And a young Israeli company brought in this technology that improves on Moses. You remember Moses? He brought water from a rock? They bring water from thin air. They bring water to Africa, to millions of people in Africa – Israeli technology!
And I was just recently in India. That’s my friend, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, great friend. I’m showing him cherry tomatoes. This is in Gujarat, India. This is Israeli technology. And what I heard there was fantastic. Famers came from the region. There’s an experimental farm there and a place where Israel gives technology knowhow to India famers. Sixty-five percent of India’s population are farmers. And one farmer after the other gets up and says: Because of Israeli technology, I’ve increased my crop yields and my income three times, four times, five times. Israel is changing the world in India, in Asia, in Africa, in Latin America, everywhere.
These are the old industries. Now, there are new industries. Israel is literally, how can I say this: Israel is literally driving the world. I’m talking about autonomous vehicles. Israel is a world leader in autonomous vehicles. Five hundred tech companies that sprang up almost instantaneously. And one of them, MobileEye up there on the left, was just sold to Intel for the paltry sum of 15 billion dollars. But the interesting thing is that Intel said to them, “Here are the keys to our 30 worldwide autonomous vehicle businesses. You run it.” Israeli technology is driving the world!
And one last industry – there are many more – but one more that you’re all familiar with. You have bank accounts? You should, okay? Well, you don’t want anyone hacking into them, right? Or into your cars, or into the planes you ride? You need cybersecurity. Everybody needs cyber. Israel has become a world leader in cybersecurity. Look at how much they invest in the hundreds of Israeli startup companies, tremendous companies. But here is another factor that you should now. Israel’s population is how much? Who knows? Class? Eight million? It’s closer to nine, but it’s about between eight and nine million, that’s correct. And what percentage of that is of the world’s population? Oh come on. It’s one-tenth of one percent. So, what percentage do we get of the world global investment in cybersecurity, in private investment in cybersecurity? We’re one-tenth of one percent of the world’s population, and we get a whopping 20% of global, private investment in cyber. We’re punching 200 times above our weight. Not two times, not ten times, not a hundred times – 200 times above our weight. That’s very strong.
Now here’s how the dots connect. Because we have this tremendous capacity for security and intelligence, and because we have this tremendous capacity for civilian technology, for making the lives of people richer, safer, more productive, many countries are coming to Israel because they want to share with us these benefits.
And that creates the third great change, which is a flourishing of Israel’s diplomatic relations around the world. You know, when I joined the Foreign Service 105 years ago, as the DCM to this city, Washington, the number two in our embassy, I think we had about 80 or 90 countries with whom we had diplomatic relations. Now the number is 160, and there are very few countries left. By the way, what are we doing with Greenland? We got to do something with Greenland. They must have some satellite needs or something that we could do there. But we are coloring the world blue. I’ve been to Africa three times in 18 months. I’ve been to South America, to Latin America. Can you imagine in the 70 years of the history of Israel a prime minister of Israel never went south of Texas? I mean, I love Texas, but we went to Argentina. We went to Argentina, to Colombia, to Mexico. And they say come back, come back. We want more. That is changing. All these countries are coming to us: India, China, Mongolia, Kazakhstan, all of them, Azerbaijan, Muslim countries. First time I visited Australia – tremendous. Far away though. So we’re coloring the world blue. And you know what? The numbers… You remember people talked about Israel’s isolation? Pretty soon, the countries that don’t have relations with us, they’re going to be isolated.
There are those who talk about boycotting Israel? We’ll boycott them.
So, the good news is very good, and it’s getting better. The bad news, and that’s the bad news, is that bad things are getting worse, and they’re very bad. And when I talk about that, we have to deal with this challenge. And I’m thinking specifically: What do we do about Iran? The force behind so much of what is bad is this radical tyranny in Tehran. If I have a message for you today, it’s a very simple one: We must stop Iran. We will stop Iran!
When I last spoke here, I warned, tried to warn the world about a nuclear deal that was a threat to the survival of Israel, the security of the region, the peace of the world. I warned that Iran’s regime had repeatedly lied to the international community, that it could not be trusted. I warned that the deal gives Iran a clear path towards developing a nuclear arsenal in little more than a decade. And I warned that by removing Iran’s sanctions, Iran’s regime would not become more moderate and peaceful, but more extreme and belligerent, much more dangerous.
And, ladies and gentlemen, that’s exactly what has happened.
Here is what Iran is doing today.
Darkness is descending on our region. Iran is building an aggressive empire: Iran, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Gaza, Yemen, more to come. Now Iran is seeking to build permanent military bases in Syria, seeking to create a land bridge from Tartus, from Tehran to Tartus on the Mediterranean. And in addition to moving its army, its air force, its navy to Syria to be able to attack Israel from closer hand, it’s also seeking to develop, to build precision guided missile factories in Syria and Lebanon against Israel.
I will not let that happen. We will not let that happen. We must stop Iran. We will stop Iran.
Last week, we read in the Book of Esther about an earlier Persian attempt to exterminate our people. They failed then. They’ll fail now. We will never let Iran develop nuclear weapons – not now, not in ten years, not ever.
President Trump has made it clear that his administration will not accept Iran’s aggression in the region. He has made clear that he too will never accept a nuclear-armed Iran. That is the right policy. I salute President Trump on this. And the President has also made it clear that if the fatal flaws of the nuclear deal are not fixed, he will walk away from the deal and restore sanctions. Israel will be right there by America’s side. And let me tell you, so will other countries in the region.
As we counter Iran’s aggression, we should always remember, we should always remember the brave people of Iran: their suffering, their hopes, their courage. Women are jailed for removing their hijabs. Students are tortured, tortured and shot for advocating freedom. We stand with those in Iran who stand for freedom. Now I believe that a day will come when this horrible tyranny will disappear, will perish from the earth and at that point, the historic friendship between the people of Israel and the people of Persia will be reestablished. Today we have Haman. Tomorrow we’ll have Cyrus and friendship and peace.
My friends, as we work together to confront the bad, there is also potential to advance the good that paradoxically comes from the bad, because most of the states in our region know—they know very well, believe me—that Israel is not their enemy, but their indispensable ally in confronting our common challenges and seizing our common opportunities. That is true for Egypt and Jordan, Israel’s long-time peace partners, but it’s also true for many other Arab countries in the Middle East. Israel remains committed to achieving peace with all our neighbors, including the Palestinians. President Trump has made it clear that he is committed to peace. I have made it clear that I am committed to peace. We appreciate the efforts of President Trump’s superb team—Jared Kushner, Jason Greenblatt and Ambassador David Friedman. Thank you all. Thank you all for your hard work for peace.
But to get peace, to get peace President Abbas has to embrace peace and to stop supporting terror. Raise your hands high if you agree with me that President Abbas should stop paying terrorists who murder Jews. You know how much he pays? He pays about $350 million dollars a year to terrorists and their families, each year. That’s about a little less than 10% of the total Palestinian budget. That’s an incredible number. He pays Hakim Awad. Hakim Awad is the terrorist who murdered this beautiful family of Ehud and Ruth Fogel and their three children, including a 3 month-old baby girl, Hadas. So he pays Hakim Awad, this murderer, and over the lifetime of this killer, he will be receiving two million dollars.
I have a message for President Abbas: Stop paying terrorists. Because what message does this send to Palestinian children? It says murder Jews and get rich. And I believe President Abbas should find better use for this money—to build roads, schools, hospitals, factories. Build life, don’t pay death. Invest in life. Invest in peace.
Israel hopes that the passage of the Taylor Force Act will make clear to President Abbas that America has zero tolerance for terror.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I’ve spoken about the good and the bad – there’s plenty of both. But I want to end with a few words about the beautiful – the beautiful alliance between Israel and the United States of America, the beautiful alliance that has brought all of you here to Washington, the beautiful alliance that you work day in and day out to make stronger and to make better.
What is this beautiful alliance made of? It’s made of our shared values. That’s the well-spring of the great alliance between our two countries. And all you have to do is leave this room, leave this hall, and you walk around a few blocks from here, and you see these majestic monuments , you can learn from them all about our common values. You know, they come from a certain book, a great book, a good book. It’s called the Bible. It said that all of us are created in the image of God. And those words inspired Jefferson when he declared in the Declaration of Independence that all men are created equal. All women too, by the way.
And that book inspired Abraham Lincoln in the darkest days of America’s Civil War. He found inspiration in the words of our greatest king, King David, when he said that the wounds of a divided America would heal and that the judgements of the Lord are true and righteous. Just as the stirring words of the Prophet Amos inspired the great Martin Luther King when he stood before the Lincoln Memorial and promised to carry on his struggle until justice runs down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.
They values are an inseparable part of America’s story. They’re an inseparable part of Israel’s story. And today, together, we are writing a new chapter in our common story, a story of freedom, of justice, of peace, of hope. And it is because we are inspired by the same ideas, because we are animated by the same values that America and Israel have forged an eternal bond that can never ever be broken.
Thank you, AIPAC. God bless Israel. God bless America. And God bless the Israel-America alliance.”
Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Donald Trump held their first meeting after Trump’s dramatic decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. In opening remarks President Trump spoke about his decision on Jerusalem.
“No one could get past Jerusalem, we’ve taken it off the table,” adding that he believes the Palestinians intend to return to the negotiating table, “and if they don’t, there will be no peace.”
In connection to his potential arrival for the US Embassy opening in Jerusalem, the President said the following: “We’re looking at coming. If I can, I will, but I’ll be there again. Israel is very special to me.”
Prime Minister Netanyahu said the following:
“Thank you. Mr. President, Donald, Melania, Sara and I want to thank you for your extraordinary friendship and hospitality. It’s always a pleasure to see you both.
This is the first time we meet Washington, America’s capital, after you declared, Mr. President, Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. And this was a historic proclamation, followed by your bold decision to move the embassy by our upcoming national Independence Day.
I want to tell you that the Jewish people have a long memory, so we remember the proclamation of the great king, Cyrus the Great, Persian king 2,500 years ago. He proclaimed that the Jewish exiles in Babylon could come back and rebuild our Temple in Jerusalem. We remember a hundred years ago, Lord Balfour, who issued the Balfour Proclamation that recognized the rights of the Jewish people in our ancestral homeland. We remember 70 years ago, President Harry S. Truman was the first leader to recognize the Jewish state. And we remember how a few weeks ago, President Donald J. Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. Mr. President, this will be remembered by our people through the ages.
And as you just said, others talked about it; you did it. So, I want to thank you on behalf of the people of Israel, and I also look forward to our discussions on both challenges and opportunities.
If I had to say what is our greatest challenge in the Middle East to both our countries, to our Arab neighbors, it’s encapsulated in one word: Iran. Iran has not given up its nuclear ambitions. It came out of this nuclear deal emboldened, enriched. It’s practicing aggression everywhere, including on our own borders. And I think we have to stop this country that chants, “Death to Israel, death to America.” Iran must be stopped. That is our common challenge.
The second is seeking, because of that challenge, to exploit the opportunity for peace, because the Arabs have never been closer to Israel; Israel has never been closer to the Arab states. And we seek also to broaden that peace to the Palestinians.
So I look forward to those discussions, but I want to just reiterate what you just said: Mr. President, I’ve been here for nearly four decades with, talking, seeking to build the American-Israel alliance. Under your leadership, it’s never been stronger. And the people of Israel see your position on Jerusalem. They see your position on Iran. They see your magnificent defense of Israel and the truth in the United Nations. And I as prime minister see something that you as president see, but others can’t see. It’s the extent of our intelligence and other cooperation in matters that are vital for the security of both our peoples.
And Mr. President, I just want to say: Thank you for your leadership and thank you for your tremendous friendship”.
So the case that spells Netanyahu’s doom is no case at all. It’s a policy dispute.
One of the distressing aspects of the police probes against Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is that police seem to be attributing criminality to normal policy-making.
To date, the Bezeq-Walla investigation, dubbed Case 4000 by the police, is being presented as the mother lode – the probe that will sink Netanyahu.
Case 4000 exploded last week with pre-dawn arrests of some of the most powerful people in Israel. Telecommunications giant Bezeq’s owner Shaul Elovitch, his wife, Iris, and their son Or were nabbed in their beds. So was Netanyahu’s former communications chief Nir Hefetz and former director-general of the Communications Ministry and Netanyahu confidante Shlomo Filber.
The headlines screamed “Bribery!” And the reports were no calmer.
The media reported that the police have hard evidence Netanyahu and Filber colluded to give Netanyahu’s crony Elovitch hundreds of millions of shekels in tax and regulatory breaks for Bezeq. In exchange, Elovitch, who also owns the popular Walla Internet site, agreed to give positive coverage of Netanyahu and his wife, Sara, on Walla’s news site.
Before we could consider the evidence, Netanyahu’s fate was sealed. He was a goner.
But when the smoke cleared, it became apparent that there isn’t anything there.
Netanyahu and Filber did give Bezeq and its subsidiary, satellite television provider Yes, regulatory and tax breaks.
On the regulatory side, the Communications Ministry agreed to end the forced separation between the two commonly owned corporations.
As Eli Zippori noted last Friday in Globes, far from being a criminal conspiracy, the move was perfectly sound policy. By allowing the two companies to work together, the government improved the lot of consumers. Together they could offer the public discounted service bundles that include landlines, Internet service and television service.
Moreover, in exchange for permitting them to work together, Bezeq agreed to permit private Internet providers to operate off of its communications infrastructure. Today, Zippori noted, 550,000 Israelis receive Internet through such services.
Would another policy move have brought better results for the public? Maybe. But that doesn’t mean this policy was wrong or criminal.
As for the tax breaks, it is true that Yes received hundreds of millions in tax relief. Yet as Zippori noted, Yes’s corporate losses topped a billion shekels. The Income Tax Authority routinely gives tax relief to corporations that lose money. And the higher the losses, the higher the tax break.
Would it have been better for the government to discriminate against Yes? Maybe. But that doesn’t mean this policy was wrong or criminal.
So the case that spells Netanyahu’s doom is no case at all. It’s a policy dispute. It isn’t surprising that the police are trying to criminalize Netanyahu’s policies in Case 4000. They’re doing the same thing in Case 1000 and in Case 3000.
Case 1000 involves Netanyahu’s support for amending the so-called Milchan law. The law, passed in 2008 under the Olmert government, provides a 10-year income tax and reporting exemption for overseas income. The law was passed to encourage wealthy expatriates and immigrants to move to Israel. It is called the Milchan law because businessman Arnon Milchan pushed very hard to get it passed.
In 2013, Milchan sought to extend the law’s exemptions to 20 years. Netanyahu supported its extension.
The police allege that Netanyahu’s support for the law’s extension owes to the fact that Milchan gave him free cigars for a decade or so. The problem with the police’s claim is that Netanyahu’s position reflects the same economic positions he has held for decades. Moreover, his position was shared by the Immigration and Absorption Ministry, which like him, supported the law and the proposed amendment because it encouraged immigration of wealthy individuals and capital flows into Israel.
Then-finance minister Yesh Atid chairman Yair Lapid is the star witness against Netanyahu. Although like Netanyahu, Lapid and Milchan are old friends, and Lapid met with Milchan twice about the proposed amendment, Lapid eventually bowed to his ministry’s position that the law induced money laundering and is therefore problematic.
Was Netanyahu’s position wrong? Did the Finance Ministry’s position serve the public’s interest better? Maybe. But that doesn’t mean his policy was wrong or criminal.
In Case 3000, Netanyahu is accused of basing his support for Israel’s purchase of German submarines on his cronies’ monetary interests. Netanyahu’s attorney and cousin David Shimron represented the German shipyard.
The problem with this claim is that Netanyahu has publicly supported expanding and modernizing Israel’s submarine fleet for 20 years.
True, some senior officials in the IDF and the Defense Ministry oppose expanding Israel’s submarine fleet. Their position is not without merit. But that doesn’t mean that Netanyahu’s position was wrong or criminal.
Yet in all of these cases, the police leakers are telling the media that Netanyahu’s policy positions were criminal acts. Rather than reject these claims as absurd on their face, and recognize that they contradict the basic values of a free society, the media have been mindlessly parroting them.
Which brings us to Case 2000 and the second half of Case 4000.
These investigations revolve around the premise that Netanyahu engaged in criminal activity when he sought to receive less hostile coverage from the Yediot Aharonot media group and from Walla news portal.
Yediot publisher Arnon Mozes and Elovitch are accused of offering bribes to Netanyahu in the form of better coverage in exchange for governmental support for their business interests. In Mozes’s case, he asked Netanyahu to act against Israel Hayom, Yediot’s primary competitor. In Elovitch’s case, Netanyahu allegedly agreed to provide Bezeq/Yes with regulatory and tax breaks in exchange for supportive coverage in Walla.
There are two problems with these allegations. First, Yediot’s implacably hostile coverage of Netanyahu never improved. And, as an inquiry at Mida website this week demonstrated, like Yediot, Walla’s coverage of Netanyahu is relentlessly negative.
Investigations 2000 and 4000 are predicated on a draconian premise that rejects the very notion of freedom of speech and expression. The premise is that any time a reporter writes about a public figure, he is offering that public figure a bribe. His expectation in writing his article is that at some point, the politician will pay him back for his work.
Conversely, if a reporter writes negatively about a public figure, he is extorting him. Under this premise, Mozes and Elovitch gave Netanyahu bad coverage because that gave them a bargaining chip against him. In exchange for better coverage, they could expect him to do something for them.
In other words, these probes assume that all reporting is inherently corrupt and criminal.
All of the police probes suffer from another problem – they all scream out selective law enforcement.
As Zippori notes, whereas Case 4000 is premised on the notion that a pro-business regulatory environment is inherently criminal, investigators never probed an even larger tax break the Communications Ministry conferred on Yes’s top competitor, the HOT cable television provider.
According to Zippori, HOT received tax breaks totaling more than a billion shekels over several years. It received these tax breaks despite the fact that it failed to abide by its obligation to provide cable service throughout Israel.
During the period HOT received the tax breaks, Mozes and his partner Eliezer Fishman were major shareholders in the company. The tax breaks continued when Mozes’s close friend Patrick Drahi bought their shares.
In other words, Netanyahu and Filber are being treated like Al Capone for giving standard tax breaks to Yes, which is owned by his friend Elovitch. Fliber’s predecessor Avi Berger gave tax breaks to Netanyahu’s nemesis Mozes, and the media is treating him like a principled professional.
This brings us back to Case 2000. Netanyahu is accused of accepting a bribe of good coverage from Mozes and in exchange working to curtail the operations of Israel Hayom, Mozes’s chief competitor. Never mind that Netanyahu did no such thing, and preferred to bring down his own government in 2014 rather than harm Israel Hayom.
Forty-three members of Knesset voted in favor of the “Israel Hayom bill” that would have shut down Mozes’s competitor. They are not under investigation.
Lapid, the star witness against Netanyahu in the Milchan law probe, met twice with his old friend Milchan to discuss the law during his tenure as finance minister. Lapid never reported his meetings.
And he’s the star witness against Netanyahu, not the subject of a probe.
Lapid’s Yesh Atid party went out of its way to advance Mozes’s financial interests. Not only did more than half of Yesh Atid lawmakers vote for the “Israel Hayom bill.” Lapid’s ministers – then-education minister Shai Piron, then-minister of social affairs Meir Cohen and then-science minister Yaakov Peri, paid Yediot millions of shekels from their ministries’ budgets for advertising.
And they all received fantastic coverage.
And none of them is under investigation.
The final problem with the investigations of Netanyahu is that as we saw this week, the police’s openly obsessive desire to “get” Bibi is corrupting the law enforcement and judicial community.
This week Channel 10 published text messages sent between magistrate’s court judge Ronit Poznansky-Katz and Israel Securities Authority investigator Eran Shaham-Shavit. In their text exchange, the two discussed and agreed on the length of continued confinement of suspects detained in Case 4000.
It is possible to read their exchange, in which they discuss the police investigators’ obsession with keeping the suspects remanded to jail, as friendly banter. It is also possible to interpret their text exchanges more critically. Shaham-Shavit wrote: Police investigators “almost beat me up or arrested me.” He angered them because he supported releasing the suspects earlier than the police investigators did. Poznansky-Katz’s responded sympathetically, “I think there is nothing scarier than that.”
It’s easy to read this as two colleagues commiserating about out of control police investigators ready to run over anyone who stands between them and their prey – Prime Minister Netanyahu.
However you interpret their exchange, the fact is that their messages were a crime. They coordinated Poznansky-Katz’s rulings before the defendants were allowed to present their cases. Yet, whereas Netanyahu’s advisers and friends are treated like mafia bosses for advancing legal policies, Poznansky-Katz and Shaham-Shavit were let off with administrative slaps on their wrists.
And we’re supposed to believe in the justice system.
It is easy to get swept away in the flood of prejudicial leaks and biased reporting that have already indicted, tried and pronounced Netanyahu’s guilt. But when you analyze the actual cases being assembled against him, it becomes clear that not only is there nothing there, these probes themselves represent an unprecedented assault on the basic norms of Israel.