Rejecting police request, court rules Netanyahu’s chief of staff can return to PM’s office
Former aide Feldstein’s testimony not enough to prove existence of meeting in which Tzachi Braverman allegedly offered to ‘turn off’ probe into Bild documents leak case, judge says
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The Rishon Lezion Magistrate’s Court on Thursday largely rejected police requests for restrictions on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s chief of staff Tzachi Braverman, spokesman Omer Mansour and former spokesman Jonatan Urich. The ruling will go into effect on Sunday to give police time to appeal.
Braverman and Mansour were interrogated Sunday over the effort that Braverman allegedly led to quash an investigation into the leak of classified documents to German tabloid Bild in 2024.
The leak was allegedly orchestrated by Urich and two other former Netanyahu aides, Eli Feldstein and Yisrael Einhorn, all three of whom are also suspected of receiving money from Qatar to propagandize for the Hamas-backing Gulf state.
Police requested that Urich be barred from entering the Prime Minister’s Office for 60 days, that Braverman and Mansour be barred from entering the office for 15 days, and that the three be forbidden from contacting each other and other suspects.
Judge Menachem Mizrahi — who has repeatedly ruled in favor of the premier’s aides, only to be overturned by a higher court — on Thursday rejected the request that the three be barred from the PMO, and said there was “no evidentiary, substantive, proportionate and practical justification” for the bulk of the police’s requests.
Mizrachi ruled that Urich could contact anyone, except for Feldstein and Einhorn for 60 days. The judge also okayed a ban on Braverman from contacting Feldstein for 30 days, as well as a NIS 5,000 ($1,600) bond. And no restrictive conditions are issued for Mansour other than a NIS 5,000 bond.
Braverman was interrogated for over 10 hours on Sunday after Feldstein said in an interview last month that the chief of staff offered to “turn off” the probe into the Bild leak, which was engineered to sway public opinion against a hostage deal with Hamas in Gaza.
According to Feldstein, Braverman made the comment in a late-night meeting in the Defense Ministry parking lot in Tel Aviv, before which Braverman instructed Feldstein to leave his phone with Mansour.
In his ruling Thursday, Mizrachi said Feldstein’s testimony was a “broken reed” that clashed with “objective evidence” and could not serve as a basis that the meeting had even taken place.
Mizrachi also said it was a “serious investigative failure” that police had not interrogated Netanyahu in the Bild case. “The only conclusion,” said the judge, was that the police were afraid Netanyahu’s testimony would contradict Feldstein’s.
The Times of Israel Community.