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(December 7, 2021)
“I left my job working for Benjamin Netanyahu in September 2017 because I thought he was no longer fit to make security decisions due to the situation around him [apparently referring to the criminal trial distraction]. I stand by this, that to this day he is unfit to hold Israel’s security in his hands because of his situation. This is worse than a criminal issue. This could have ended with thousands of dead people.”
Within minutes, his testimony was out in the open.
(22.11.2021)
„Who did not see with his own eyes the level of control he exercised in this area can not realize it.“
The ex-adviser called his former employer „someone who would be beyond obsession with control. His entourage knows he should never be disturbed, except for anything related to the media. He wants to know everything, down to the smallest detail. Even when he was in security meetings, he demanded that he be passed notes.“
(22.11.2021)
Former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu asks for permission to be excused from the remainder of the testimony of Nir Hefetz, his former aide-turned-state’s witness, in his criminal trial.
(22.11.2021)
Detailing how the then-prime minister tried to use Elovtich’s “gift” of the Walla site, Hefetz said that Netanyahu was a “control freak” when it came to his public image, and that “he could not be more controlling in all matters relating to the media and his social media channels.”
“He demands to know everything, down to the smallest detail,” Hefetz said, confirming that Netanyahu himself made the requests to change coverage at Walla.
The corruption trial of Benjamin Netanyahu took a dramatic turn Monday with the arrival of Nir Hefetz – former close aide and confidant, spin doctor, and, now, key state witness against his former boss
key prosecution witness in former Benjamin Netanyahu’s trial began testifying on Monday, one week later than planned, telling the court that the former prime minister was heavily fixated on media coverage of himself.
Nir Hefetz, a former media adviser to Netanyahu and his family, will testify in all three of the corruption cases against the former prime minister. His testimony is therefore expected to continue for quite some time.
Netanyahu’s defense team requested that the hearing be postponed.
According to the prosecution’s statement, the new information is not directly connected to the testimony of state witness Nir Hefetz, a former aide of Netanyahu’s. In the wake of the announcement, Hefetz’s lawyers asked the Jerusalem District Court to postpone their client’s testimony scheduled for Tuesday.
The man who will take the witness stand in Jerusalem’s District Court on Tuesday is a refined embodiment of the Israeli power structure. Nir Hefetz was once the right-hand man of the country’s three dominant alpha males: former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Yedioth Ahronoth publisher Arnon Mozes and one-time tycoon Nochi Dankner.
There’s no better indicator of the judgment and moral compass of the men who presided over the nation’s government, media and economy.
Put simply, Hefetz is expected to testify that Netanyahu gave him orders dozens of times over several years in 2013-2016 to order former Walla CEO Ilan Yeshua to direct coverage the way the former prime minister wanted – and that Netanyahu gave him orders to ensure that Communications Ministry policy benefited Bezeq and Walla owner Shaul Elovitch.
They told him that Nir Hefetz, Netanyahu’s former media advisor, told them that an investigation had been opened and that „all of them needed to coordinate their stories.“
„They proposed that I say that I initiated everything, that it was for ideological reasons, that I didn’t want the site to be leftist,“ Yeshua said.
„They said that I needed to erase all of our correspondence,“ to which Yeshua objected, and said he told Elovitch that he was concerned that he would accidentally lose private photos. According to Yeshua, the two pressed him to delete the photos and said it critical that he did it.
Yeshua, the first witness, is testifying on the claims that Walla gave favorable coverage to Netanyahu at the request of Walla owner Shaul Elovitch. The latter, who was the controlling shareholder of the telecommunications giant Bezeq, is accused of bribing the prime minister, which, according to the indictment against Netanyahu and Elovitch, he did in exchange for regulatory benefits the prime minister gave Bezeq when he was communications minister.