JERUSALEM (AP) – Israeli prosecutors released a new indictment on Sunday detailing the charges against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a corruption case in which he is accused of exchanging favors with a powerful media tycoon.
Netanyahu has been accused of fraud, breach of trust and taking bribes in three corruption cases. One claims that Netanyahu promoted hundreds of millions of dollars in regulations to the owner of telecoms company Bezeq in exchange for positive coverage on its popular news website Walla.
In response to a request by Netanyahu’s lawyers for more details, Israeli prosecutors released a letter on Sunday alleging that there were 315 incidents in Walla being asked to make their coverage more favorable to Netanyahu and his family. They said there were indications that Netanyahu was personally involved in 150 of those incidents.
He said the requests included giving more time or highlighting positive articles about Netanyahu and his family, changing the headlines and diminishing or even removing the unfavorable stories. It also included alleged requests for negative coverage from Netanyahu’s rivals.
The document listed all 315 suspicious incidents, which allegedly included numerous requests to publish flattering articles and photos of Netanyahu’s wife, Sara, to hide embarrassing spending reports and personal information about the Netanyahu family and attempts to embarrass their rivals. He quoted Bezeq’s controlling shareholder at the time, Shaul Elovitch, expressing concerns that Netanyahu would not approve profitable deals for the company if negative articles were published.
On January 17-19, 2013, for example, he said that a Netanyahu associate persuaded Elovitch to publish stories saying that Naftali Bennett’s wife, head of a rival religious party, worked in a non-kosher restaurant. Several weeks later, Netanyahu, through the same associate, allegedly pressured Walla to remove critical articles about a lace dress that his wife had used to take office in the new parliament and replace it with favorable criticism. The site consented to both requests, he said.
On another occasion, Elovitch, at Netanyahu’s request, reportedly ordered Walla to stop the live broadcast of a rally by Netanyahu’s opponents during the country’s 2015 election campaign.
Netanyahu’s trial began last year and is expected to resume next month. He denies all charges against him, saying he is the victim of a witch hunt orchestrated by hostile media, police and prosecutors.