Afrasianet - Antoine Shalhat - Talk about the corruption of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and most of his entourage, including employees and advisers, has returned to the headlines of the Israeli media and the writings of its analysts, especially on the eve of the upcoming Israeli general elections.
As some of them believe, Netanyahu's corruption is embodied not only in criminal cases for which he has been tried for some time, but in an attempt to establish a complete style of governance that mixes the personal with the public, as the aforementioned criminal files prove, and between power and political survival, where the state is run, especially since the indictments were filed with decisions that are considered to be functional under the weight of Netanyahu's trial and not for the public interest, such as the constant attack on the judiciary, the police, the public prosecution and the media, and attempts to change the rules of the game as is happening Through the plan to overthrow the judiciary, for example, in order to transform the state from the rule of law to a rule of loyalty to the ruler/leader.
There are also those who argue that corruption has affected coalitions by legitimizing extremism in exchange for survival, which has been reflected in the introduction of racist figures and parties into the government, granting them ministries with tools of power in exchange for Netanyahu's political support, entrenching a violent policy against the Palestinians, violent rhetoric against opponents at home, and mobilizing public opinion against elites, the Supreme Court, and the media.
In general, there is a consensus in most analyses that Netanyahu's corruption is not only what he took, but what he did to the state in order to avoid being held accountable, on the one hand, and what he allowed to happen in order to survive on the other.
However, it should be noted that following the decision of the Supreme Court of Israel on January 18, 2023, which caused the dismissal of the head of the Eastern Orthodox Shas party, Aryeh Deri, from his position as Minister of Interior and Health in the current sixth government of Benjamin Netanyahu, after ruling that his appointment was "extremely unreasonable."
As a result of his repeated criminal convictions, the most recent of which was his conviction for tax fraud in 2022, multiple reactions have emerged, perhaps the most striking of which is that Israel has become a corrupt state for several years, given that by the most widely circulated definition, it is not only the corrupt state that is gnawed at by corruption, but also the one that is in line with and acknowledges corruption, and does not do anything to fight it.
Anyone who follows the corruption file in Israel will find that recent years have witnessed a peak in the corruption of those at the head of the regime. For example, since 1996, only one prime minister has been linked to corruption cases and investigated, including a prime minister, Ehud Olmert, who was put on trial and imprisoned, while his predecessor, Ariel Sharon, escaped indictment after falling into a coma His eldest son was sentenced to prison in corruption cases linked to his father's name and election campaigns, and his second son faced a corruption case in cases related to his father.
The other two prime ministers, Ehud Barak and Benjamin Netanyahu, were investigated in corruption cases but did not end with an indictment, while investigations into the latter ended with indictments that are still pending before the court and have been contributing to political instability for several years.
A quick inventory also shows that two former heads of state were forced to have their terms curtailed or suspended: the first, Ezer Weizmann, for corruption cases, and Moshe Kassab, for moral issues for which he was sentenced to seven years in prison. Two ministers, former Finance Minister Avraham Hirschson and former Minister of Industry and Trade Shlomo Benizri, were also jailed for financial corruption, and were preceded by Minister Aryeh Deri himself, who was released from prison several years ago, as well as former Minister Haim Ramon for working to serve the public on an ethical issue, and sentenced at least seven Knesset members to actual and non-verbal imprisonment.
The name of the head of the Yisrael Beiteinu party, current Knesset member Avigdor Lieberman, who held several ministerial positions, most notably defense and foreign affairs, was linked to investigations into a case described as dangerous, related to the receipt of millions of dollars in funds through shell companies, and apparently linked to international gangs and even gangs involved in money laundering, a complex case that has reached many countries, especially Cyprus and Russia. In parallel, a series of indictments have been filed against senior officials in a number of state institutions, in particular against the private secretary of former Prime Minister Olmert, and against officials of the Tax Authority and others.
In fact, there are many factors for the rise of corruption in Israel, and in connection with the 1990s, it is necessary to point out the method of direct elections for the prime minister, which was later abolished, and the follow-up of primaries for the lists of candidates in most parties, as the combination of these two factors contributed to increasing the dependence of politicians on financial donations.
In practice, it can be said that since the 1990s, money has become a necessary condition for being elected to the party's list of candidates for the Knesset, not to mention standing at the head of the party and winning In the elections.
However, in parallel with the increasing political dependence on money, adequate means and tools have not been built to combat political corruption, such as the development of a system of appropriate legal restrictions and penalties, or the adoption of transparency mechanisms. Regarding this last issue, Transparency International gives Israel a very low grade every year in terms of transparency and control over the security budget and security activities.!
