Judges in response to Ohana – Netanyahu testimony to continue as scheduled

Ministers in the National Security Cabinet demanded on Sunday that the Jerusalem Regional Court judges in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's criminal trial delay his upcoming testimony due to the events in Syria in recent days.

Netanyahu is set to take the stand on Tuesday and testify three days a week, for six hours each day. He will testify as a defendant in three criminal cases that include a total of three counts of fraud and breach of trust, as well as one count of bribery. The letter from the ministers came after a series of other attempts in the past few weeks by Netanyahu's lawyers and allies to delay the testimony or decrease its weekly frequency.

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich penned a letter on Sunday afternoon which received the signatures of at least 10 out of the cabinet's 15 members, not including Netanyahu, according to a spokesperson for Smotrich. In the letter, which was made out to Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara and the director of the Court Authority, judge Tzahi Uziel, the ministers wrote that the court's demands on Netanyahu would "unequivocally" constitute "severe harm to the state's security."

"Anyone who ignores this severe warning may be found responsible for security failures, and history will judge them for it. We demand that you urgently reconsider the conduct of the judicial system regarding the management of the Prime Minister's legal proceedings and find a solution that will allow him to fulfill his central role in leading the State of Israel at this critical time," the ministers wrote.

"There is no place for considerations detached from reality when the security of the state and national resilience are at stake," they added.

"We request that you bring this letter to the attention of the panel of judges and summon the relevant security officials to present the implications and current security aspects confidentially before the judges," the ministers concluded.

The request was a public letter and not an official court filing, and its status from a procedural perspective is unclear. According to a number of reports, some cabinet ministers made similar demands to Baharav-Miara during a meeting on Saturday night, who responded that the demands were an improper attempt to intervene in a criminal trial and that the prime minister was welcome to make the requests to the judges hearing his case, according to protocol.

Ministers urge judicial flexibility for PM

Foreign Minister Gideon Sa'ar, who, as justice minister in the previous government, backed Baharav-Miara's appointment to the position, issued a separate letter of his own with a similar demand, yet using more conciliatory language.

In his letter, which he addressed only to Baharav-Miara, Sa'ar wrote, "As someone who sits in Cabinet meetings, the security situation is known to you, including the dramatic recent developments in Syria. At this time, a heavy responsibility rests on the government and especially on the Prime Minister. The national interest is to take this into account and allow optimal functioning for the good of the state and its security."

"Therefore, the reasonable request of the Prime Minister to conduct his testimony in a manner that takes into account the constraints of the time and the role becomes even more valid in light of the developments," Sa'ar wrote.

"The Attorney-General, who on the one hand heads the prosecution, and on the other hand represents the public interest before the court, is in the best position to present a balanced position before the honorable court.

"Therefore, a step is now required that will contribute to strengthening public confidence in the judicial system, which lives within its people, and also balances between the interest of conducting the trial and the broader public interest at this time," Sa'ar concluded.,

Later on Sunday, the judges in the case, Rivka Friedman-Feldman, Moshe Bar'am, and Oded Shacham, denied a request by Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana (Likud) to take the prime minister's parliamentary responsibilities into account and show flexibility in the testimony schedule.

Ohana's request was based on a clause in the Members of Knesset Immunity law, which requires that courts coordinate with the Knesset speaker when an MK is called upon to give testimony so that the testimony does not affect the MK's parliamentary activity.

Both the Knesset's Legal Advisor, Sagit Afik, and the state prosecutors in the case opposed the request for various reasons. In its short ruling on Sunday, the judges wrote that the legal clause in question did not apply to cases in which the MKs were the defendants. Once their parliamentary immunity was lifted, which is the case for Netanyahu, the MKs were treated like all other defendants, the judges wrote.