Veteran Beytenu minister Uzi Landau steps down

Tourism Minister Uzi Landau announced Sunday that he would not run in the upcoming elections.

The Yisrael Beytenu MK, who was first elected in the Likud party in 1984, has also served as public security minister, as a minister in the Prime Minister’s Office, and as national infrastructure minister.

“I see myself continuing to be active and to contribute, but for me the time has come to continue outside of the parliamentary system,” he said in a statement announcing his retirement from the Knesset.

Landau did not reference the ongoing corruption investigation into senior members of his party.

“Yisrael Beytenu, under the leadership of [Foreign Minister] Avigdor Liberman, has a central place in the current political system, and I would like to thank it for the years of joint work,” he said.

Landau, born in Haifa in 1943, served as an officer in the Paratroopers Brigade, and holds a PhD in engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He joined Yisrael Beytenu in 2008 after failing to be elected to the Knesset on the Likud list in 2006.

Police pressed forward with their corruption investigation into Yisrael Beytenu on Sunday, questioning Moshe Lion, a senior party member and a close associate of Liberman.

The year-long undercover corruption investigation into Yisrael Beytenu became public last week when police arrested 31 suspects in the affair, which allegedly involves a large system of bribes to Yisrael Beytenu politicians in return for political favors.

Many of the suspects in the affair are high-level members of Yisrael Beytenu. Landau’s name has not been mentioned in connection with the investigation.