Car belonging to ex-caretaker who testified against PM’s wife found torched

The car of a former custodian for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s official residence, who has since become a leading critic of the premier and his wife, was found burned Monday morning, in what police suspect is arson.

The apparent attack on Menny Naftali comes days after Sara Netanyahu and another official in the Prime Minister’s Office were indicted on charges of misusing public funds for personal meals, a case in which Naftali provided testimony.

Police said they have opened an investigation into the incident, after the car was found burning outside Naftali’s home in the city of Afula early Monday morning, according to Hebrew media reports.

There were no injuries in the incident, but the car suffered extensive damage.

Police suspect the fire may have been set intentionally.

שרפו לי את הרכב pic.twitter.com/BLHuB28qda

— מני נפתלי (@1978naftali) June 24, 2018

Naftali, who worked as a caretaker at the Prime Minister’s Residence before successfully suing Sara Netanyahu for abuse, has become one of the leaders of a protest movement against Prime Minister Netanyahu, accusing him and his wife of corruption.

Reacting to the apparent attack, political activist Eldad Yaniv, who has led a series of weekly anti-corruption protests with Naftali, wrote on Twitter that “this will end in murder.”

Naftali served as caretaker at the Prime Minister’s Residence from 2011 to 2012 and alleged he was verbally and physically abused by the prime minister’s wife during his employment. In 2016 he was awarded NIS 170,000 (about $43,735) in damages from the state after a labor court accepted his claims.

Accusations by Naftali, as well as by another maintenance worker, Guy Eliyahu, ranged from claims of verbal abuse and what he called irrational demands by Sara Netanyahu regarding the management of the residence to allegations that the prime minister’s wife made him return wine bottles to supermarkets and then pocketed the deposits.

Naftali also testified to police investigating irregular spending for meals at the Prime Minister’s Residence, for which Sara Netanyahu and Ezra Saidoff, a former deputy director general of the Prime Minister’s Office, were indicted Thursday.

The two are accused of fraudulently charging some NIS 359,000 ($100,000) in gourmet meals to the state, violating rules which ban the ordering of prepared food when a chef is already employed at the Prime Minister’s Residence.

According to the indictment, Netanyahu falsely claimed there was no cook at the time in the Jerusalem home in order to purchase meals from restaurants.

The charges against Saidoff are more severe as he is also accused of illicitly hiring chefs and servers for private meals at the Netanyahu home. The PMO staffer also falsified invoices for such activities in order to get them approved.

Since the indictment, new reports about the Netanyahus’ lavish spending have emerged daily, including bringing dirty clothes on state trips abroad to have it dry cleaned and trying to get reimbursed for subscribing to a channel showing the “Big Brother” reality show.

The Netanyahus have denied wrongdoing and have slammed what they describe as a media smear campaign against them.

Since making his claims against Sara Netanyahu, Naftali has regularly been pilloried by the Netanyahu family and their backers as a disgruntled ex-employee and political operative working to topple the prime minister.