Australia Jewish groups call on PM not to re-appoint minister suspected of aiding Leifer

A pair of Australia’s most prominent Jewish organizations are calling on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to refrain from granting Yaakov Litzman a posting in his next government due to the allegations that the outgoing deputy health minister pressured officials in his office to falsify their psychiatric evaluations in which they deemed Malka Leifer unfit for extradition back to Melbourne, where she is charged with 74 counts of sexual abuse.

The statements from the Zionist Federation of Australia and the Executive Council of Australian Jewry come hours after the Israel-Australia Chamber of Commerce publicly apologized for a meeting it organized between visiting health officials from Western Australia and Litzman’s office earlier this week.

“These allegations of executive interference in the judicial process raise grave questions about the integrity of the handling of the Leifer case in Israel while Mr. Litzman remains in any government position. We call upon Prime Minister Netanyahu to announce an official inquiry into the allegations, and to confirm that Mr. Litzman will not be appointed to any executive office pending the outcome of the inquiry,” says the Executive Council of Australia Jewry, an umbrella group representing 200 organizations across the country.

“These additional allegations if proven true, are an insult to the survivors
of sexual abuse and to Jewish communities around the world,” says the Zionist Federation of Australia, the umbrella group for Zionist organizations in the country. The ZFA also similarly called on Netanyahu to refrain from re-appointing Litzman to a government post while the latter is still being investigated.