Ex-minister Gabbay: Netanyahu has ‘come to the end of the road’

New leaks about Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s negotiations on an alleged deal to secure favorable coverage from Israel’s biggest-selling daily, Yedioth Ahronoth, prompted a surge in criticism from opposition lawmakers on Saturday.

Former environmental protection minister Avi Gabbay, who recently joined the Labor party after resigning from the government and the Kulanu party, said Saturday he believes Netanyahu has “come to the end of the road” in government.

Gabbay said the new police investigations into Netanyahu’s affairs, and particularly the alleged quid pro quo deal with Yedioth Ahronoth publisher Arnon Mozes, are “the most severe” cases the premier has been involved in.

“He held negotiations with Mozes over our public perception; our perception was bartered for cash,” Gabbay told an audience at a cultural event in Beersheba.

Party officials have speculated that Gabbay will likely contend for the Zionist Union (Labor) party leadership, posing a challenge to current opposition chief Isaac Herzog. The former minister acknowledged Saturday that he had joined the party “to achieve a position of influence,” but insisted that he hadn’t decided yet whether to seek the leadership.

The ongoing corruption investigations of the prime minister have fueled speculation of the coalition’s possible collapse and boosted the prospects of new elections, should the premier be indicted.

Speaking at the Beersheba event Saturday, a lawmaker for the centrist opposition party that could potentially form the next government said that, if true, the Mozes case was “one of the most dire affairs Israel has seen.”

Meir Cohen of the Yesh Atid party, who was welfare minister between 2013-2014, said that as a former history teacher, “when we talk about tyranny and the winds of fascism, these begin with a takeover of the media.”

Cohen said the allegations, whether strictly illegal or not, were far more severe than claims that the prime minister had illicitly received gifts from Hollywood film producer Arnon Milchan.

“If the prime minister is trading in the free media, that is the beginning of a dictatorship,” he said.

Cohen said Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit, as a friend of Netanyahu’s, should not be overseeing the corruption probe.

Cohen, whose party has surged in recent polls and has sometimes surpassed the ruling Likud party in surveys, said that he would rather defeat Netanyahu in an election.

“It’s not about the prime minister’s investigations,” he said. “It’s a trend. The public feels that this is a government with a path or a plan, it feels the government’s disconnect from the public and is looking for an alternative.”

At a separate cultural event Saturday, Zionist Union MK Nachman Shai predicted the criminal investigations into Netanyahu would force him to resign.

“The various scandals the prime minister is involved in will not allow him to serve out his full term,” Shai said.

In the first case for which the prime minister is being investigated, police are checking whether Netanyahu and his wife Sara received some 400,000-600,000 shekels ($100,000-150,000) in gifts of cigars and fine wines from producer Milchan. The couple have reportedly insisted that the sums involved were far lower, and that the gifts were unremarkable since the Milchans are their best friends.

The premiere is also being investigated for gifts allegedly received from other businessmen.

The second case involves the alleged negotiations with Mozes, and focuses on the prime minister’s supposed promise to advance legislation to hobble the Sheldon Adelson-controlled Israel Hayom daily if Mozes’s paper Yedioth Ahronoth gave him more favorable coverage.

Police are inclined to recommend indicting Netanyahu in both cases, Channel 10 news reported Friday night. It quoted a senior police source adding, however, that the investigations were still ongoing. Mozes is to be questioned again early next week, it said, and Netanyahu is then likely to be questioned a third time.

The prime minister has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing, and his lawyer has insisted Netanyahu has done nothing illegal.