Netanyahu argues ‘hostile’ Walla coverage, telecom reforms prove bribery claims ‘absurd’

On his second day of testimony in his criminal trial, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted repeatedly that he never came to any give-and-take arrangement with business tycoon Shaul Elovitch and asserted that the allegation he received positive media coverage from Elovitch’s news website Walla was demonstrably false.

Netanyahu acknowledged in court that he had tried to get Elovitch to change the political orientation of Walla in a right-wing direction, and even went so far as to advise him to fire its staff, but maintained that the news outlet never became more favorable to him and was in fact actively hostile.

And during his testimony, the prime minister did concede that his wife Sara Netanyahu had made requests to Elovitch through a mutual friend by the name of Ze’ev Rubinstein regarding specific aspects of Walla’s news coverage, as alleged in the indictment.

But he insisted there had never been any agreement or understanding with Elovitch through which he would get positive press on the news website, describing the allegation as “ridiculous” and “absurd.”

The prime minister’s testimony, and the line of questioning taken by his defense attorney on Wednesday, focused entirely on Case 4000, in which it is alleged that following a key meeting in 2012, Netanyahu and Elovitch came to an agreement whereby the prime minister would advance regulatory decisions to favor Elovitch — who was the majority shareholder in the Bezeq telecommunications giant — and would receive favorable media coverage from Walla in return.

The atmosphere in the Tel Aviv District Court where Netanyahu is testifying was far less raucous on Wednesday than on the first day of his testimony, with only very minor protests outside the courthouse and a far smaller media presence.

Yet tensions still erupted in the courtroom, after Netanyahu complained about a post on X by Channel 13 reporter Aviad Glickman during the hearing claiming the prime minister had contradicted statements he made to the police when questioned during the investigative stage of the case.

Elovitch’s attorney insisted in court that Glickman had cited an initial transcription of Netanyahu’s answers to the police which was later changed after a recording of the questioning found the transcript to be wrong. The prime minister became noticeably irate and angry, denouncing Glickman — without mentioning his name — as a spokesman for the State Attorney’s Office and not a journalist.

Proceedings were interrupted briefly on two occasions after Netanyahu was handed notes which were deemed urgent enough to halt the hearing for several minutes. At the end of the day the prime minister asked to speak privately with the judges, although a decision on that request has not yet been made.

Throughout the day, Netanyahu expressed intense indignation at the allegations in the indictment, as he has done throughout the legal process against him, and repeated that he had never arrived at any arrangement with Elovitch, and least of all one that could be considered as having taken a bribe.

Netanyahu’s defense attorney Hadad asked the prime minister at length about what the prosecution described in the indictment as a key meeting between him and Elovitch, a dinner hosted by the Netanyahus for Elovitch and his wife.

The indictment alleges that it was at this meeting that the quid pro quo agreement was reached between the two men.

Netanyahu said he viewed the meeting as an opportunity to get to know Elovitch, and when asked if the two discussed a quid pro quo arrangement, the prime minister responded: “Absolutely not.”

Testified the prime minister, “He didn’t speak to me about his businesses, didn’t hint to me about them, didn’t ask me for anything. And if he would have asked for something he would have got a resounding ‘no’.”

“It’s not good to be a friend of Bibi; it doesn’t help,” Netanyahu said.

He said they did discuss Walla, with Netanyahu telling Elovitch there was an “economic opportunity in providing the right-wing public with an outlet that reflects its positions,” but he said that this never transpired and that the news site persisted with its original, “left-wing” and hostile attitude to him.

Elovitch, Netanyahu said, told him that changing Walla’s political direction was not so simple because of the existing staff at the outlet, to which the prime minister said he replied, “So switch the people.”

The prime minister also testified that when he saw Walla wasn’t going to change its political direction, he searched for potential purchasers to buy Elovitch out in 2013, although such a move did not transpire at the time.

Hadad also had Netanyahu address reforms to the internet provider sector in Israel that his government implemented during his government following the 2013 elections. The prime minister said the reforms opened the market to competition and broke up what he said was Bezeq’s monopoly at the time, since the company controlled critical telecommunications infrastructure.

“Bezeq had the cables; we needed to open this monopoly and open up this infrastructure to other companies,” said Netanyahu.

Asked by his defense attorney Amit Hadad how the reforms against Bezeq “sit with the idea that you had a ‘give and take’ relationship with Elovitch,” Netanyahu said the reform did “severe damage” to Bezeq and “totally contradicts that theory. It collapses it….the allegation collapses, it is as clear as day,” he said, adding “It [an agreement] never happened and this is the proof.”

Hadad also quizzed Netanyahu at length about the actual coverage on the Walla news website, which the prime minister took pains to emphasize repeatedly had remained persistently hostile to him and his agenda, including after the 2012 dinner, as the January 2013 elections approached.

“It was the eve of the elections, this is it, no one knew if I would be elected, this was the time to implement an ‘understanding,’” Netanyahu said.

“You can see [through Walla’s coverage] that they were attacking me and attacking and attacking.”

Hadad asked Netanyahu rhetorically why, if he had an agreement with Elovitch for good press from Walla, he didn’t reach out to him.

“Because there was no agreement, and this entire theory is collapsing,” he replied.

Hadad also noted that Netanyahu spoke with Sheldon Adelson, the late owner of the pro-Netanyahu free-sheet Israel Hayom, and its editor Amos Regev on “dozens” of occasions in 2013 but spoke directly with Elovitch only twice that year.

Asked why he didn’t speak with Elovitch, Netanyahu replied: “I had no reason to turn to Walla; it was basically like Schocken,” referring to the publisher of the left-wing Haaretz newspaper Amos Schocken.

“To others, I made requests, and that shows the entire difference; there was no understanding, no agreement with Elovitch, it didn’t exist. There was a reason to turn to them, with Walla there wasn’t.”

Hadad also questioned Netanyahu about the involvement of Ze’ev Rubinstein, a friend of Sara Netanyahu’s and Elovitch, who the indictment alleges served as a middleman for numerous requests by Netanyahu to the Walla owner and its CEO Ilan Yeshua.

“The whole idea that I went to Rubinstein to get to Elovitch is ridiculous. He lived in America, that’s a seven-hour time difference which in the world of internet news is huge,” Netanyahu averred, adding, “I didn’t need Rubinstein to get to Elovitch.”

Netanyahu asserted that Rubinstein largely made requests regarding Walla’s news coverage of his own accord, although the prime minister conceded that Sara was in touch with him and made some requests.

Asked by Judge Moshe Bar Am if he knew of Rubinstein’s requests in real time, Netanyahu said “no,” although he then backtracked slightly, saying he may have known about a small number of them when they were made.

Weeks of testimony scheduled

In the coming weeks, Netanyahu is to give testimony every Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, with court sessions scheduled through the end of December. The court sessions are scheduled to begin at 10 a.m. and end at 4 p.m. every day of the hearings, with a break for lunch.

Netanyahu’s defense attorneys are questioning the prime minister first, over the course of several days. Once the defense concludes its questions, the lawyers for the prosecution from the State Attorney’s Office will be given the chance to cross-examine Netanyahu, which will likely last for the majority of time the prime minister is at the witness stand.

The prime minister’s defense attorneys will then be able to call Netanyahu back to the stand to clarify aspects of his testimony under cross-examination should they so wish.

The court has said that should pressing matters requiring the prime minister’s attention arise, it will consider whether or not to call a recess to allow him to address the concern at hand.

Amid an ongoing war and with the Middle East in chaos, it would be reasonable to expect a not-insignificant number of interruptions to the court proceedings during Netanyahu’s testimony.

The charges

Netanyahu is on trial in three corruption cases. He faces charges of fraud and breach of trust in Case 1000 and Case 2000, and charges of bribery, as well as fraud and breach of trust in Case 4000.

Case 1000 revolves around allegations that Netanyahu and his wife Sara received expensive gifts illicitly from Hollywood media mogul Arnon Milchan worth some NIS 700,000 and that Netanyahu violated conflict of interest laws when he provided Milchan with assistance in renewing his long-term US residency visa and sought to help him with tax issues.

In Case 2000, the prime minister is accused of fraud and breach of trust over his alleged attempt to reach a quid pro quo agreement with the publisher of the Yedioth Aharaonot newspaper Arnon (Noni) Mozes, whereby Yedioth would give the prime minister more positive media coverage in exchange for legislation weakening its key rival, the Israel Hayom free sheet.

Case 4000, also known as the Bezeq-Walla case, is the most serious the prime minister faces, in which he is accused of authorizing regulatory decisions that financially benefited Bezeq telecommunications giant shareholder Elovitch by hundreds of millions of shekels. In return, Netanyahu allegedly received favorable media coverage from the Walla news site, which Elovitch also owned.

Netanyahu denies wrongdoing and says the charges were fabricated in a political coup led by the police and state prosecution.

At a press conference on Monday night, Netanyahu charged that police investigators and state prosecutors “didn’t find a crime, so they concocted a crime…. They arrest dozens of people around me, they ruin their lives, they extort them with threats so they’ll give false testimony… isolation, sleep deprivation. Everything so that they give false testimony.”

“Everything goes,” he added, “in the effort to bring down Bibi.”