[Update added on March 18, 2019 at 02:54 Ukrainian time: Sunday in Haifa, Benny Gantz indeed called for a state commission of inquiry to probe the Case 3000 submarine investigation after fresh allegations emerged that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may have received $4.5 million. Gantz called it the “greatest security-related corruption in the history of the State of Israel.” In response, Netanyahu’s Likud party issued a statement saying that Gantz had completely “lost his sense of judgement.”]
The Israeli election is getting ugly: the cell phone of the leading Blue and White party candidate Benny Gantz got hacked. The Shin Bet security agency informed him some five weeks ago about the hack. The info was leacked to the press on March 14. According to a Haaretz report, people close to prime minister Netanyahu immediately insinuated that Iran got a sex tape of Gantz having an affair, but later backtracked.
On March 16, the Netanyahu camp released a campaign video saying that the attempt to blame Netanyahu for the leak of the Gantz cellphone hack was meant “to distract from the fact that the Iranian regime openly supports” Gantz’s candidacy.
This is of course nonsense. The Netanyahu camp is under pressure because, at least now, in the polls, the Blue and White camp is ahead of Netanyahu’s Likud.
Netanyahu seems desperately trying to tarnish the former General Chiefs of Staff of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) Benny Gantz, Moshe Ya’alon and Gabi Ashkenazi who are all running on the new Blue and White ticket together with the former minister of finance Yair Lapid.
Bibi has already moved to the far right and has been indicted by Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit on three of the charges presented against him by the police, the Yedioth Ahronoth case being one of them. It will get worse today, March 17. According to press reports, today, Benny Gantz will address on TV the Case 3000 investigation, which so far has troubled several associates of Netanyahu but not the premier himself. Gantz will claim that Netanyahu has received a NIS 16 million / $4.5 million bribe in exchange for the approval of the $2 billion submarine deal with the German company thyssenkrupp. If Gantz can present some kind of proof, Prime Minister Netanyahu’s days may be numbered.
Books about the history of Israel at Amazon USA
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in 2019. Photo: US State Department. This photo is in the public domain.
Article added on March 17, 2019 at 20:43 Ukrainian time. Update added at 20:44: In the $2 billion submarines and other ships deal with thyssenkrupp, police already recommended investigating for bribery people such as prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s lawyer and cousin David Shimron, his former bureau chief David Sharan, his former security adviser Avriel Bar-Yosef, the former head of the navy Eliezer Marom.
