Disputation and accusations

The US presidential debate took place at 4 a.m. Israel time, meaning the Hebrew papers are out of the loop Tuesday morning about the outcome of the head-to-head between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. That doesn’t stop the tabloids from talking about the first of three debates as if it were the election itself, and using the same headline (once again).

“Head-on collision,” reads the big print in Yedioth Ahronoth and Israel Hayom. “Trump or Clinton: This morning we’ll know who won,” announces Yedioth Ahronoth’s front page. Haaretz plays it down, as there was no real news to report on the debate before it took place, but notes on its front page that in the run-up “Trump seems like someone who can win the race.”

The big news story with any substance, however, is the corruption scandal that rocked the Yisrael Beytenu party, with at least 16 of its top members being charged with a slew of offenses, with more to come after the High Holidays. The story takes the top of Haaretz and as small blurbs on the front pages of Yedioth Ahronoth and Israel Hayom. But the latter sticks the Yisrael Beytenu issue on Page 7 behind an article about Sheldon Adelson — the free daily paper’s billionaire donor — and his wife making comments about Israel and the US at some conference held by the Israeli American Council.

Not surprisingly, the headline is a gushing endorsement of the organization, quoting Miriam Adelson calling the members of the organization “the soldiers of Israel in the US.” Sheldon Adelson is quoted saying that he doesn’t aim to make IAC compete with AIPAC for political influence in Washington, but he did say that he wants to turn the organization into a political powerhouse.

How that’s more important than a former minister from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s previous two governments being suspected of bribery, fraud and breach of trust, as well as obstruction of justice and possession of cocaine, I’m not sure.

The state prosecutor noted in its announcement, Haaretz reports, that there are additional suspects, besides the 16 already announced, whom it has yet to decide to level charges against.

Yedioth Ahronoth calls former tourism minister Stas Misezhnikov “minister of cocaine” in its Page 2 story. The key quote in the story is the comment from the state prosecutor’s office calling the case against the Yisrael Beytenu brass “one of the biggest public corruption investigations uncovered in Israel.”

Israel Hayom goes a step further than the rest, devoting a separate article headlined by Yisrael Beytenu’s bland response to the charges: “We hope the accusations aren’t correct.”

Gidi Weitz, in his Haaretz op-ed, likens Yisrael Beytenu to organized crime operating inside the government. He breaks down the charges, explaining how top members of the party used government and coalition funds to line their pockets, give cushy sinecures to party devotees, and enrich the party itself. The protagonists of this story, like an earlier corruption scandal involving the party in 2004, “are politicians, activists, spokespeople and movers and shakers who get up in the morning, go to the Knesset or government office in order to rip off — allegedly — the public coffers, while they enjoy golden connections with the top brass in power.”

Speaking of brass, former IDF general and potential chief of staff candidate Ofek Buchris, who was charged with raping a subordinate earlier this year, will appear in court on Thursday, but not before his lawyers try to strike a plea deal with the prosecution. “Buchris’s lawyers certainly explained to him that this process won’t end in dropping the charges,” Yedioth Ahronoth reports. “If he wants to strike a plea deal and save himself a trial whose outcome could be devastating, he needs to give up something, to agree to cop to some charges.”

Last week the IDF conducted a full-scale war simulation against Hamas and Hezbollah, including a call-up of thousands of reservist soldiers to simulate a battle on two fronts, Haaretz reports. To its dismay, even though all the top military brass and thousands of troops around the country took part in the drill, politicians were nowhere to be seen. Only Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman and former general and Housing Minister Yoav Galant turned out from among the cabinet. The paper adds that this government, even compared to previous Netanyahu administrations, is relatively inexperienced in defense matters, while the region is undergoing tumult.

Even the prime minister himself didn’t attend, the paper notes, as he was “preoccupied with preparing his UN speech and meeting with [US President] Barack Obama.” An unnamed cabinet minister who was contacted by the paper and asked why they didn’t attend replied, “We didn’t know about the drill and weren’t invited to it.”