Unruly Likud MK says state prosecution ‘full of’ excrement

A controversial lawmaker from the ruling Likud party known for his bad boy antics slammed prosecutors over a pair of corruption investigations into Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, saying that the State Prosecutor’s Office is “full of shit.”

Speaking at a parlor meeting in the central city of Ra’anana, Oren Hazan accused prosecutors of seeking to use legal means in order topple the prime minister.

“[There are those] from the [State] Prosecutor’s Office who have been sitting for years upon years in the same chairs, who are only looking for a way to replace those who look a little different from them, those who speak a little different from them,” Hazan says in video of the event published Wednesday by Israel Radio.

“If there is something the media needs to do, and if there is a stable that needs to be cleaned because it is full of shit, it is the State Prosecutor’s Office,” he said, while adding that “it is clear to all of us” that prosecutors are engaged in “persecuting” Netanyahu.

Since being elected in 2015, Hazan has garnered a reputation for boisterous behavior both in and out of the Knesset, which most recently included a selfie he snapped with US President Donald Trump on the tarmac of Ben Gurion International Airport and a narrowly averted showdown with a Jordanian MP at the Allenby Bridge border crossing.

Also speaking at the parlor meeting was fellow Likud MK Miki Zohar, who said that Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit and police have been intimidated into pursuing an indictment of Netanyahu.

“[They] piled on the attorney general and police. [The attorney general and police] will be scared to not file an indictment, they are forced to file charges. Do you understand what we’ve sunk to?” Zohar said.

The Likud lawmakers’ comments came amid reports that Netanyahu will likely be indicted in two corruption investigations known respectively as “Case 1000” and “Case 2000.”

Last week, Netanyahu’s former chief of staff Ari Harrow agreed to turn state’s witness in the investigations, providing testimony in exchange for a more lenient punishment over alleged wrongdoing at a political consulting firm he founded.

As part of the deal, Harow is reported to have “incriminated” Netanyahu in Case 2000, which revolves around suspicions that Netanyahu agreed to an illicit quid pro quo with the publisher of the Yedioth Ahronoth daily Arnon “Noni” Mozes that would have seen the prime minister advance legislation to kneecap the rival Sheldon Adelson owned paper Israel Hayom, in exchange for more favorable coverage from Yedioth.

Harow is also expected to provide testimony in Case 1000, in which Netanyahu and his wife, Sara, are alleged to have received hundreds of thousands of shekels’ worth of gifts from billionaire, notably cigars and pink champagne from Israeli Hollywood producer Arnon Milchan.

Prior to the announcement of the state’s witness deal with Harow, police explicitly said for the first time that the corruption investigations involving Netanyahu deal with “bribery, fraud and breach of trust.”

Netanyahu has repeatedly denied wrongdoing in both cases.

Despite the wave of unfavorable reports and growing calls for him to resign, Netanyahu has sought to play down the significance of the developments, saying in a video last week, just hours after the Harow deal was announced, that investigations against him were “background noise” and that he was focused on working on behalf of Israeli citizens.