Prosecution lashes ‘calumnious comments’ after Yair Netanyahu accuses it of treason

The state prosecution on Sunday night excoriated “calumnious and inciting comments” made against it, in an apparent retort to a tirade by the incoming prime minister’s son in which he accused judicial officials of treason and seemed to indicate they should face the death penalty for pressing charges against his father.

In a strongly worded statement, the prosecution said it “takes a severe view of verbal and physical attacks” against officials while adding that “unfortunately in recent days we’ve again witnessed calumnious and inciting comments that have little to do with legitimate criticism.”

The statement came hours after Yair Netanyahu said senior prosecutors and police committed “treason,” a crime that is punishable by the death penalty, by allegedly framing his father Benjamin Netanyahu, who is currently on trial for corruption.

The prosecution, decrying a public atmosphere that has led to the “incessant harassment of devoted public servants” by activists, said that “attempts to denigrate and deter police investigators and prosecution attorneys, who toil day and night for the public and its protection, are doomed to fail.”

The head of the State Attorney Association, Orit Korin, warned that attorneys’ safety was increasingly at risk amid inflammatory discourse.

“Statements made in the past day represent severe incitement that is unprecedented, even by the standards we have come to expect,” Korin said.

“Just last week an attorney was attacked in a courtroom by a man facing criminal charges,” she added, referring to an assault at the Tel Aviv District Court that is currently being investigated.

“We warn that a disaster is only a matter of time. There are those who will take things a step further, interpret them in a certain way and decide to take action. We will not stand by or be silent.”

Yair Netanyahu claimed Sunday on Galey Yisrael Radio that officials had committed “a willful coup d’état.”

“It’s called a coup, it’s called treason, and everyone can look at the State of Israel’s laws and see what the punishment is for treason — and it is not prison,” he told the right-wing radio station.

The comments from the younger Netanyahu, who has a history of making incendiary statements, echoed near-constant attacks on law enforcement and the judicial system as the Likud leader’s backers have sought to delegitimize the cases against him.

Benjamin Netanyahu is on trial in three corruption cases, facing charges of fraud and breach of trust in all three, as well as a bribery charge in Case 4000.

Under Israeli law, treason can be punishable by death in some cases, but Israel has carried out the death penalty for that crime only once, when imposed by a military court against IDF officer Meir Tobianski in the 1948 War of Independence, although he was posthumously fully exonerated. The only other occasion the death penalty has been carried out since then was against Holocaust architect Adolf Eichmann, who was hanged in 1962 for genocide and crimes against humanity.

Coalition deals for the incoming government have included an agreement to enact the death penalty for terrorists.

Yair Netanyahu, who has positioned himself as a right-wing provocateur, has regularly posted inflammatory messages on social media and tweets against those he believes have wronged him and his family, sometimes running afoul of terms of use and libel laws.

In a follow-up tweet later Sunday, Netanyahu said that his intention had been to highlight “the severity of the crimes committed by those who concocted the cases, according to Israeli law, and nothing beyond that, certainly not to call for harming anybody.”

The elder Netanyahu denies any wrongdoing in the cases against him and claims, without evidence, that the charges were fabricated in a witch hunt led by the police and state prosecution. Those claims have been echoed by his supporters and political allies, who have backed far-reaching changes to the judicial system that critics say could shield him.

Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara has cautioned that the incoming coalition’s proposals for judicial reform, as well as an ongoing legislative blitz that includes changes to Israel’s quasi-constitutional Basic Laws, could render Israel “a democracy in name only.”