How basketball officials exposed the Yisrael Beytenu scandal

In March 2013, Yisrael Beytenu MK and deputy Interior Minister Faina Kirshenbaum attended the finals of the national women’s basketball league, giving pause to Shaul Eisenberg, a member of the Israel Basket Association (IBA) board, who wondered what she was doing there.

The answer eventually led police on a far-reaching investigation that this week brought the arrest of 30 Israeli officials, including high-ranking current and former members of the Yisrael Beytenu party.

Eisenberg was told at the time that Kirshenbaum planned to donate money to the IBA, he related to Channel 2 News on Friday. Around the same time, then-IBA chairman Avner Kopel announced that he had secured an NIS 1 million ($260,000) donation to the association.

“They didn’t say where it came from,” Zvi (Zvika) Sherf, another board member and a legendary coach of Israeli, Greek and Russian teams told Channel 2.

When Sherf and Eisenberg later investigated the money’s source, they found an odd note in the books: Around NIS 100,000 had been transferred to a woman, Batya Cohen, the wife of Agriculture Ministry director general Rami Cohen, a Yisrael Beytenu man.

Sherf and Eisenberg said they were told this sum was a “commission” awarded to Cohen for helping secure the donation to the IBA. Why Cohen was the recipient of the sum remains unclear, the Channel 2 report noted.

It was, however, clear to Sherf and Eisenberg that something untoward was afoot, and the two went to the police in August 2013 to notify them of their findings.

“If money is given from a ministry to the IBA… one cannot take a commission,” Sherf said.

“Zvika and I were summoned (by police),” said Eisenberg. “I sat there for a few hours, Zvika sat there for many hours.”

“I was asked (by police) to keep silent about it. I kept silent. (They said) they wanted to continue their investigation,” Sherf said. “When it blew up this week, that’s when I understood (how far) it had gone.”

Police’s Lahav 433 serious crimes and anti-corruption unit announced this week that it suspected various officials had “conspired in a calculated manner to advance their personal and public interests and to receive money for personal use, while committing various crimes in a manner that significantly impeded the administration of their areas of governance.”

Investigators suspect that large sums of money were inappropriately transferred to non-government organizations and various other groups. In return, the organizations allegedly made nepotistic appointments, as well as circulating some of the money back to public service officials in the form of cash payoffs and benefits.

“The covert investigation revealed a calculated method wherein the suspects and their representatives unlawfully transferred, using their powers as public officials, large sums of public funds to [various] bodies and authorities, in exchange for large benefits for them or their associates, including appointments, payments and more,” the police statement said.

Among those detained were Kirshenbaum, Rami Cohen, Avner Kopel and another former IBA official, Moshe Kaliski.

Others detained were the head of the Shomron Regional Council, Gershon Mesika, and the treasurer of the Binyamin Regional Council, Effy Peles. The two are accused of bribery and accepting unspecified benefits.

David Godovsky, the chief of staff for Kirshenbaum’s Yisrael Beytenu party, is suspected of several counts of bribery.

Police say they have state’s witnesses and incriminating evidence against some of the suspects. A senior police officer said that the massive bust had saved the state millions, since the illicit money transfers would have continued had the police not intervened.

On Wednesday, the court ordered former tourism minister Stas Misezhnikov to be remanded in police custody for eight days. Misezhnikov is a former Yisrael Beytenu lawmaker who served as minister from 2009 to 2013.

Investigators are looking into suspicions that he fixed millions of shekels worth of government tenders for large public events to benefit personal acquaintances. He is also suspected of receiving bribes in exchange for the transfer of funds to various organizations while serving as tourism minister.

Tamar Regional Council Chairman Dov Litvinoff, as well as Megilot Regional Council head Mordechai Dahamn, and the council’s director David Blau were also arrested.

Foreign Minister and Yisrael Beytenu party head Avigdor Liberman has slammed the police investigation and said he was “convinced” of their innocence.

In a Facebook post on Friday, Liberman charged that when it came to Yisrael Beytenu “there are no elections without investigations.”

As for Eisenberg and Sherf, they say the Kirshenbaum affair was only one of many issues of possible corruption in the IBA on which they had given testimony to police.

“We gave them a lot of material,” said Eisenberg. “Terrible things. I assume the wheels of justice turn slowly but these things will be coming up.”

“I’m sad,” Sherf said. “It saddens me that our basketball is managed this way, and that our country is managed this way if (the allegations) are true,” he said.

Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.