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Israel Resilience party leader Benny Gantz will reportedly support a new law allowing incumbent Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to serve in the government despite multiple indictments against him, according to Hebrew media.
Current Israeli Parliament (Knesset) legislation bars elected officials from serving as government ministers while being charged with a crime.
The activists say they use the black flag, pinning them to the back of vehicles, to symbolize the danger a prime minister under indictment poses to Israeli democracy, according to The Times.
Netanyahu was indicted last year on three charges following a years-long corruption investigation, including breach of public trust, bribery, and fraud.
Two weeks after the elections, Netanyahu’s criminal trial on charges of bribery and breach of trust begins. He doesn’t have to resign unless he is convicted and if that conviction is upheld through the appeals process.
And, once the dust has settled on this election, how does Netanyahu plan to defeat his main rival and his potential nemesis – the Israeli justice system?
Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party is projected to win a narrow lead over Benny Gantz’s Kahol Lavan in next week’s Israel election, according to two polls published Sunday by Channel 12 and Kan public broadcaster.
Israeli court says Prime Minister Netanyahu corruption trial to begin March 17, two weeks after national elections.
Warning – This historical documentary contains some explicit Scenes that are of a violent nature and may be disturbing to some viewers!
This Film contains footage taken by Soviet cameramen after the liberation of the Auschwitz camp in January 27, 1945.
Among other things, it depicts the camp area immediately after entry by the First Ukrainian Front of the Red Army.
Documentary pictures are interspersed with an interview with Alexander Vorontzov, the cameraman who accompanied the Red Army soldiers and did most of the filming. The whole is accompanied by commentary describing, among others, the selection and extermination process, medical experiments and everyday life in the Auschwitz concentration camp.
Israel’s security apparatus and its over-collaborative judiciary would do well to look up, then commit to memory, the words of U.S. Supreme Court justice Louis Brandeis: „Publicity is justly commended as a remedy for social and industrial diseases. Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants.“
As Knesset Speaker, Yuli Edelstein has the authority to block the Knesset Arrangements Committee from meeting, thereby blocking the convening of the House Committee and preventing it from discussing the immunity request.
This is Edelstein’s most important test as an elected official: Will he be faithful to his position as Knesset speaker, or will he be faithful to the man who has decided to hold the country hostage?
By requesting immunity Netanyahu hopes to postpone all of this until after the March 2 election. But he knows from all the incessant polling he has carried out that this is a hard sell, even among his right-wing base. In recent days, he tried to float his “immunity is a cornerstone of democracy” canard, but it didn’t fly.
According to Israeli law, the Knesset House Committee is to discuss his request and should it be approved, the request will need to pass a vote by the Knesset plenum.
However, since the House Committee has not been appointed since the April general election, and is not expected to be assembled before the upcoming March election, the discussion will only take place in several months. Until the committee makes a decision, an indictment against Netanyahu can’t be handed officially to the court.
Israel’s incumbent Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s deadline to formally request immunity from Knesset (Israeli parliament) Speaker Yuli Edelstein expires Wednesday night.
It is expected that Netanyahu will opt for protection from prosecution in three corruption cases against him, Hebrew media reported.
Heading a three-judge panel, High Court of Justice President Esther Hayut said there were no legal impediments holding Netanyahu back from seeking reelection, ruling that the question is not ripe for a decision before he is actually tasked with leading a government.
The hearing on the metter is held by Supreme Court President Esther Hayut, Deputy President Hanan Melcer and Justice Uzi Vogelman.
Hayut stressed that there isn’t any legal impediment barring Netanyahu from running in the March election, while Vogelman said it’s unprecedented to rule on an issue before an authority was given – in this case the mandate to form a government.
Hayut says three-justice panel must first decide whether the court should even debate the issue, echoing instruction from AG; hearing comes after petition by 67 members of academic and high-tech worlds objecting to allowing a Knesset member battling criminal charges to be tasked with putting together a coalition
Netanyahu has said he will announce this week whether he will seek parliamentary immunity from prosecution. The survey found that just 33 percent supporting such a move and 51% oppose it — indicating that there is significant objection even within the right.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has added a new definition to the language he’s invented, which he is using to distort reality. On Saturday night he said that his appeal to the Knesset to grant him immunity “would not be avoiding standing trial.” As is his wont, Netanyahu is trying to confuse the public and plant doubts regarding what is self-evident, whether this applies to norms of governance, social norms or dictionary definitions. All of this is meant to garner public support for his reckless conduct and his flight from the arm of the law.
(26.12.2019)
https://t.co/2opJERA3xe JPost
For a decade, Netanyahu dominated Israel like few others since founding prime minister David Ben-Gurion, leaving a huge imprint on every sphere: diplomatic, economic, military.
But in 2019 – Netanyahu’s own annus horribilis, as Queen Elizabeth II referred to her own “horrible year” in 1992 – his utter dominance began to fade.
Channel 12 reported earlier this month that Israel’s longest-serving premier will request immunity by the end of December.
Just days after the “Afghanistan Papers” were published, only 48 Members of Congress voted against the massive military spending of the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act. They continue as if nothing happened. They will continue lying to us and ripping us off if we let them.
The corruption involved in the purchase of submarines and ships from the German shipbuilder ThyssenKrupp makes it among the worst such affairs in Israel’s history. It involves bribery, fraud, breach of trust and money laundering by a criminal network that functioned at the highest levels of Israel’s government and business people between 2009 and 2019 , funnelling government funds from the defense budget into private pockets, by swaying decisions regarding purchases from the German shipbuilder.
📹: Elineudo Meira
Three marches have entered the city of Cochabamba already, as they chant for justice and the end of this de facto government that is led by the self-declared president Jeanine Anez.
Last Friday, the Bolivian security forces attacked a crowd of civilians in Cochabamba that were demonstrating in support of the deposed President Evo Morales. The attack would turn into a massacre as nine Indigenous people were killed at the hands of the security forces.
The ICC said it took the findings very seriously. The MoD has said the allegations are unsubstantiated.
„The personnel of the Armed Forces, who participate in the operations for the restoration of order and public stability, will be exempt from criminal responsibility when, in compliance with their constitutional functions, they act in legitimate defense or state of necessity,“ the decree reads.
Demnach sind die Mitglieder der Sicherheitskräfte, die „an den Operationen zur Wiederherstellung der Ordnung und der öffentlichen Sicherheit teilnehmen, von strafrechtlicher Verantwortung befreit, wenn sie in Erfüllung ihrer verfassungsmäßigen Aufgaben zur legitimen Verteidigung oder im Notfall handeln“. Zudem können sie „alle verfügbaren Mittel nutzen, die im angemessenen Verhältnis zu den Risiken des Einsatzes stehen“.
The year-long investigation claims to have found evidence of murders by an SAS soldier, as well as deaths in custody, beatings, torture and sexual abuse of detainees by members of the Black Watch.
A senior SAS commander was referred to prosecutors for attempting to pervert the course of justice, the investigation claims.
Operation Northmoor was set up by the government in 2014 and looked into 52 alleged illegal killings.
Its closure was announced by the government before Royal Military Police detectives even had a chance to interview the key Afghan witnesses.
As part of its efforts, Likud seeks to stage a joint demonstration with the right-wing Im Tirtzu NGO near Mendelblit’s Petah Tikva home on Monday evening to express support for the prime minister.
(14.02.2018)
The police announcement Tuesday – that the investigations into two cases involving Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had been completed – came 13 months after Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit decided that a “preliminary examination” of the allegations, which itself took six months, should become full-fledged criminal investigations.
The prime minister has branded all three cases a baseless “witch hunt.” and his attorneys accused Mandelblit of interfering with elections by announcing his intention to indict during a campaign season.
Netanyahu’s recent announcements, like a pledge to annex parts of the West Bank he made three days before the April 9th elections, have barely registered in the campaign of Blue and White, the centrist party co-led by Generals Benny Gantz, Moshe „Bogie“ Ya’alon, and Gabi Ashkenazi (all former chiefs of the Israeli Defense Forces) along with former finance minister Yair Lapid
Netanyahu has been in favor, since his earliest days as a politician over three decades ago, of a presidential system of governance – without insisting on a constitution to check and balance the president’s power, however. He sees the Israeli parliament as an unnecessary nuisance. In recent years, he has described every perfectly legal and legitimate attempt to replace him as a “coup.” As far as he’s concerned, the only purpose of an election is to confirm his personal mandate to rule.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s frontal assault on Channel 12 television was in line with his permanent strategy: If you can’t silence them, incite against them. Plan A failed when the acting chairman of the Central Elections Committee rejected Likud’s request for an injunction that would bar Channel 12’s legal correspondent, Guy Peleg, from continuing to publish statements made by key prosecution witnesses in the cases against Netanyahu prior to the election. So Netanyahu turned to Plan B – libeling Channel 12 as anti-Semitic and urging the public to boycott the station.
After Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu s shocking attack on Channel 12 television, it s clearer than ever who the good guys and the bad guys are, and the current election revolves around this choice.
PM claims Keshet Media Group, which produced the HBO series ‚Our Boys‘ that he blasted as anti-Semitic, is ‚committing a terror attack against democracy‘
We know what should be the fate of perpetrators. The man who more than two decades ago marched in front of a coffin (which he didn’t see, of course, a meter behind him) in a protest against Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, and who incited from a balcony in Zion Square, with posters of Rabin in SS uniform below him (which he didn’t see either), has gone back to his evil ways. Or, as the verse says in another context, as a dog returns to his vomit, so a fool repeats his folly. He seeks chaos, violence and loss of restraint that will allow him to show off his “leadership” and take control of what’s happening.
Earlier the Central Elections Committee rejected a petition from Netanyahu’s Likud party to bar news outlets from publishing transcripts and documents from Netanyahu’s corruption investigations ahead of national elections next month.
Until now, we knew from Attorney-General Avichai Mandelblit that the prime minister would likely be indicted, with the timing expected to be by December.
However, Netanyahu has a strong chance of getting Mandelblit to drop any indictment in Case 2000, the Yediot Ahronot-Yisrael Hayom Affair, probably has a 50/50 chance of beating the charges in Case 1000, the Illegal Gifts Affair, and has a series of real defenses even in Case 4000.
Such trepidations are valid for any caretaker government, all the more so regarding Netanyahu, who’s already suspected of subverting every value of governance to his personal interests. Someone who doesn’t loathe quashing the rule of law to be saved from the terror of the law, who doesn’t hesitate to shamelessly lie to preserve his rule, who isn’t deterred from overturning the parliamentary rules of the game to keep the charges against him from scrutiny seems destined to raise security tensions to distract public opinion from issues he isn’t comfortable with.
Protests have continued for over two years near Mandelblit’s home in Petah Tikva to pressure him to take a stronger stance in the various probes against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Any doubts about illicit deals between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and fallen telecom tycoon Shaul Elovitch in the police’s Case 4000 should be put to rest after the details of Shlomo Filber’s statements to police investigators were leaked this week.
This is the case where the police believe Netanyahu traded friendly coverage by Bezeq’s Walla news site in exchange for help with regulations for the company, Israel’s dominant telecom provider. Filber, who had been appointed director general of the Communications Ministry in 2015 shortly after Netanyahu took over the portfolio, was the point man for the alleged trade-offs.
Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit’s lengthy description of Netanyahu’s alleged illicit dealings with Elovitch, known as Case 4000, took up the majority of the 57-page document released in February in which Mandelblit set out the allegations that prompted him to announce a criminal indictment against the prime minister, pending a hearing.
Netanyahu is scheduled to attend his own pre-indictment hearing in the case on October 2-3,
One of the intermediaries described her as being close to Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit. “She knows how to influence him. She’s close to him. If she doesn’t control the Justice Ministry, obviously Bibi will go to jail,” he said.
Another of Shaked’s representatives suggested that “only she can get immunity for Bibi. She knows how to explain to the media why immunity is warranted. She has credibility.
Anti-corruption activists have been holding regular protests near Mandelblit’s home for years, demanding he indict Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the corruption cases into his affairs.
(13.08.2019)
Ominous pre-election right-wing purges inspired by Trump’s brazenness have been met with apathy and impotence on the center-left
According to a government official, at least 500 local leaders and activists have been arrested or detained across Kashmir since the beginning of last week.
Faesal is not the first Kashmiri politician to be detained in Srinagar over the past week. Since the Centre revoked Jammu and Kashmir’s special status by nullifying Article 370 and divided the state into two Union Territories, two former chief ministers – Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti – have been arrested and a third, Farooq Abdullah, is said to be under house arrest.
The order to arrest Mufti, the leader of People’s Democratic Party, also held in a Srinagar guest house, said her activities were likely to cause a “breach of peace”.
Israel’s Civil Administration approved the proposed plans this week and construction is currently pending. Among units approved include 537 in Alon Shvut, 18 in Ma’aleh Adumim, 66 in Efrat and 96 in Kiryat Netafim.
Bolsonaro is trying to rewrite the history of a torturous “dictatorship that lasted for 21 years” and “deny it all” according to Psol leader Ivan Valente.
The FCC documents show that Southcom’s balloons are carrying small, satellite-like vehicles housing sophisticated sensors and communication gear. One of those sensors is a synthetic aperture radar intended to detect every car or boat in motion on a 25-mile swath beneath the balloon.
The balloons also have advanced mesh networking technologies that allow them to communicate with one another, share data and pass it to receivers on the ground below.
(21.07.2019)
To his passionate supporters, Netanyahu, known fondly by his nickname, “Bibi,” is an unrivaled world leader with cultlike status. They credit him with expanding Israel’s international alliances, helping foster its thriving high-tech industries and remaining a steady hand on security. For his fans, the allegations of corruption and impropriety that have plagued him are an underhanded attempt by his left-wing rivals to unseat him, as they have failed to do so at the ballot box.
(24.07.2019)
Why doesn’t Mr. Netanyahu seek out different coalition partners? The centrist Blue and White party is expected to be the strongest opposition party in the coming Knesset and a unity government of Mr. Netanyahu’s Likud and Blue and White would likely be popular among Israelis, a majority of whom believe Mr. Netanyahu is the most fit to lead but don’t have much love for his past coalition partners, especially the ultra-Orthodox.
„What is painfully happening here is the biggest and most dangerous demolition operation outside of war operations,“ Walid Asaf, the Palestinian minister in charge of monitoring Israeli settlements, said in a video from the site.
„This operation aims to cut off Jerusalem from Bethlehem (in the southern West Bank),“ he added.
Residents fear another 100 buildings in the area in a similar situation could be at risk in the near future.
(today)
Forces deploy at dawn days after top court approves order to evict Wadi Hummus residents, in a move activists are concerned sets a precedent to affect thousands
(17.07.2019)
In less than 24 hours, 42-year-old Ismail Obeidiya, his wife Nida, and their six kids, could be made homeless. It’s a terrifying reality that Obeidiya is struggling to grapple with, his unease and frustration more palpable with every word.
“We fought so long and so hard, for years, to try to save our home. But in the end, the Israeli courts, the ‘High Court of Justice’ as they say, could not offer us any justice,” Obeidiya told Mondoweiss from the front yard of his home.
The Obeidiyas’ home is one of 10 buildings slated for an unprecedented mass demolition by Israeli authorities in the occupied East Jerusalem town of Sur Bahir.
While Israeli demolitions of Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem are commonplace, typically under the pretext that the homes were built without Israeli-issued permits, the homes in question stand on ‘Area A’ and ‘Area B’ land under the control of the Palestinian Authority (PA), as designated by the Oslo Accords.
(18.06.2019)
Israel’s Supreme Court yesterday gave the green light for the state to demolish 13 apartment blocks built in “Area A” of the occupied West Bank, but which now lie inside the route of the illegal Separation Wall.
According to Haaretz, Palestinians say that the ruling “sets a precedent that will enable the demolition of thousands of buildings in the West Bank”.
The general election will take place on September 17, and Netanyahu’s pre-indictment hearing is set for October 2 and 3.
Peretz also characterized his joining forces last week with Orli Levi-Abekasis, chairwoman of the Gesher party, as “a chance to win,” otherwise Labor would suffer “sure defeat.”
(07.07.2019)
After months of playing defense against the never-ending stream of details regarding the contents of the prime minister’s pending indictment on corruption charges, one could practically feel the exhilaration in the Netanyahu camp at being able to finally go on the offensive — launching a full-throttle attack against Barak, leader of the new Democratic Israel party.
(08.07.2019)
Barak attacked Netanyahu again on Sunday evening, telling Channel 12 that the Submarine Affair was not being advanced, despite evidence implicating the prime minister. He said the police want to move the case forward but are being prevented by Mandelblit. He also accused Netanyahu of going overboard in designating his political rivals as leftists.
The dispute is over how to divide spots 11 through 14 on the joint ticket, the same problem that scotched the four-party framework in the election this past April.
Jurist Raif Zreik, who is holding talks with the parties, has warned in recent days about a massive hemorrhaging of the Arab community’s confidence in the parties.
„Netanyahu pressed the button for the Knesset dissolution and there is no turning back,“ Gantz says in a statement to the media from Tel Aviv. „Netanyahu sees (election) polls and invents lies.“
Anyone speaking to people close to the prime minister and his ministers are hearing panic that stems not just from Benjamin Netanyahu’s vigorous attempt to stop the clock on the new election. On the agenda, they whisper, is a pending security crisis. The evil will come from the Persian Gulf, the Gaza Strip or the northern border, generated by Iran and its proxies. Then the military agenda will soon overwhelm the political one, overshadowing the political parties’ petty considerations.
TV survey projects center-left and Arab parties would win more seats than right-wing and Orthodox factions, though path to forming government far from clear
Speaking this morning with Army Radio, Yuli Edelstein said that Knesset members from many factions approached him to discuss the election. „All the conversation ended with the same line: ‚Wow, what a mistake we made.'“
(21.06.2019)
Hadash (The Democratic Front for Peace and Equality – Communist Party of Israel) and three political parties representing the Arab-Palestinian national minority in Israel, Ta’al, Ra’am and Balad, have announced they will reunite for the upcoming Knesset elections.
Sources in the Knesset said that the prime minister could push for a law cancelling the Knesset’s dispersal despite Yinon’s view, however the High Court of Justice would most likely block the move. Sources told Haaretz the chance of passing a law that would annul the dissolvement is practically zero.
Netanyahu and Blue and White party co-chairman Benny Gantz are reportedly not personally involved in any negotiations over a unity government.
Blue and White issued a statement reacting to the report, saying, “There is only one option for cancelling the elections: Netanyahu steps down to deal with his legal issues and Blue and White will lead a wide government.”
Yair Lapid, the co-chair of opposition party Kahol Lavan, said on Sunday that he believes a unity government headed by his outfit is the „right thing for Israel.“
Lapid said he would agree to form a coalition with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in response to comments made by former Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman on Saturday.
Instead of holding his tongue, and thanking the good Lord and the exhausted, hesitant, merciful prosecution for the VIP criminal procedure it granted his wife, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu chose the second option, the one close to his heart: Slandering law enforcement and baseless, ridiculous self-pity.
Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo announced new restitution of identity. The individual in question will be presented Thursday a press conference.
Argentine organization Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo announced Monday it has found the 130th missing grandchild whose identity was stolen during the country’s last military dictatorship (1976-1983).
Agency has been obtaining surveillance warrants based on false information, high court told
Netanyahu is currently trying to find additional lawyers, as the former head of his defense team, Navot Tel Zur, resigned. He recently approached several leading defense attorneys, but many have already turned him down due to concerns over payment.
Netanyahu has unpaid debts to his previous lawyers, because he refuses to pay his legal expenses out of his own pocket and has been unable to secure the permits committee’s approval to raise money from his wealthy businessmen friends.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s lawyer on Monday evening informed the attorney general that his client will attend a hearing on his three criminal cases set for October 2, after failing to convince Avichai Mandelblit to postpone it.
In a video posted online, Netanyahu’s lawyer Amit Hadad said, “We will come to the hearing, but it would have been right to reconsider the date and delay it.”
If Netanyahu refuses to confirm his attendance by today’s deadline, then the hearing will be canceled and a summary decision would be made that could lead to his indictment within days or weeks.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appointed Likud lawmaker Amir Ohana as justice minister on Wednesday. Political sources told Haaretz that Ohana was appointed because unlike other Likud members, he supports changes that would grant immunity from indictment to acting prime ministers, as Netanyahu is facing possible indictment in three cases of fraud, bribery and breach of trust.
Wittes attributes this dramatic possibility to Israel’s anomalous constitutional regime, which he characterizes as “super-weird.”
Asked to elaborate, he explains in a follow-up email that, beyond the fact that Israel lacks a written constitution (which is not in itself unique), it also has “the combination, on the one hand, of a system of parliamentary supremacy, and, on the other hand, a highly aggressive court that asserts broad authority of judicial review.” Ironically, however, anything the High Court does can be reversed by the legislature, “given that the court’s authority itself is a creature of the Knesset.”
TV report uncovers draft agreement between Likud and ultra-Orthodox parties to change law barring discriminatory separation between men and women in public
Israeli law does not prohibit an outgoing prime minister from appointing or dismissing ministers before an election nor does it require Knesset approval if the appointee is already a Knesset member.
The three were released without being questioned and without being informed whether they were suspected of anything. Israeli soldiers are not authorized to arrest Israeli civilians in the West Bank, but are entitled to detain them until the police arrive. The three said they never came in contact with the police.
The activists were members of the left-wing organizations Combatants for Peace and the Jordan Valley Coalition.
A moment before democracy was burned on the stake, Israel received a second chance. We must take full advantage of it.
‚You never know which circumstances you’ll find yourself in,‘ party leader tells Channel 12, arguing he hadn’t lied to his voters in holding coalition talks with the premier
Netanyahu may win the new election but it will be too late to push through the High Court override and the immunity from prosecution: Who will sign a coalition agreement with someone on his political deathbed?
The unit’s horizon-scanning involves systematically monitoring huge numbers of information sources and indicators to identify patterns and so-called weak signals of coming disruptions that could have an important, even transformative, impact on the world in the decades ahead.
It means looking for trends that haven’t yet become fully observable, or at least haven’t attracted much attention.
Kahol Lavan, Labor and Meretz organized the protest, but the Arab parties were not invited. Several hours before the protest and following public pressure, Gantz invited Arab Israeli lawmaker Ayman Odeh, the chairman of Hadash, to speak.
Tens of thousands of Israelis gathered in the central city of Tel Aviv Saturday, protesting proposed legislation granting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu immunity from prosecution on a series of corruption charges.
The protesters outside the city’s Museum of Art also called for protecting Israel’s democratic identity against government overreach.