Judah Ari Gross is The Times of Israel's religions and Diaspora affairs correspondent.
Former Walla editor-in-chief Yinon Magal compares his former boss Ilan Yeshua, who is testifying in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s corruption trial, to Yigal Amir, who assassinated former prime minister Yitzhak Rabin.
“Ilan Yeshua won’t be the first Yemenite to bring down a prime minister,” Magal tweets, referring to Amir, who was also the son of Yemenite parents, later clarifying that the comment was satire.
Yeshua has repeatedly referred to his former employee in his testimony, speaking of Magal in glowing terms.
Former Knesset member and Walla editor Yinon Magal delivers a statement to the press outside his home in Tel Aviv on January 25, 2016. (Flash90)
“Yinon Magal was a major contribution to the website,” Yeshua said, when referring to the hiring of Magal in 2012.
Yeshua also says in his testimony that Magal routinely railed against the skewed coverage that Walla was forced by its owners, Shaul and Iris Elovitch, to give to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his family as part of an alleged quid pro quo for regulatory favors for their company, the Bezeq telecommunications firm.
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