"They set you up": Hadad confronts Mandelblit in court

The second day of testimony by former Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit continued Monday in the Jerusalem District Court, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's attorney, Amit Hadad, focusing on actions carried out by Securities Authority investigators in the Bezeq affair, from which Case 4000 developed. Hadad argued that some of the actions were carried out before approval was given to investigate the prime minister, while Mandelblit confirmed that he was unfamiliar with some of the details presented to him.

"Your memo that you submitted begins on October 2. I will show that even before that, the investigating unit behind your back carried out all kinds of actions without approval to bring Case 4000 into the world," Hadad argued.

He later sought to clarify whether approval to investigate Case 4000 had already been given in June 2017. Mandelblit replied: "According to the memo, it's logical that there wasn't."

The article that was in the background of the investigation

Hadad then turned to an article published by journalist Gidi Weitz in Haaretz in October 2015, which raised claims about a connection between Netanyahu's coverage on the Walla website and regulatory benefits for the site's controlling shareholder, Shaul Elovitch.

Mandelblit testified that he had heard about the article, but does not remember whether he read it in real time. According to him, only in retrospect did he learn that it served as a catalyst for advancing the investigation.

Ready for more?

Hadad asked Mandelblit whether he had previously said that journalists Gidi Weitz and Raviv Drucker are great enemies of the prime minister. Mandelblit replied: "Could be."

He was later asked whether the conflict-of-interest arrangement made for Netanyahu stemmed from the article. Mandelblit rejected this and explained that the arrangement was based on information presented to the legal counsel regarding the relationship between Netanyahu and Elovitch.

The investigator who printed the article

Hadad then returned to actions carried out by Securities Authority investigators after the opening of the public investigation in the Bezeq affair in June 2017.

Hadad asked whether Mandelblit was familiar with the claim that Weitz's article was lying on investigator Eli Levi's desk.

Mandelblit replied that he did not know about it. At this stage, prosecutor Yehudit Tirosh intervened and clarified that it was not claimed that the article was on Levi's desk in June, but rather that in that month Shlomo Filber was questioned and materials related to Walla were found on his phone.

Hadad later asked whether Mandelblit was familiar with the statements of the Securities Authority's legal counsel, Eran Shaham-Shavit, according to which the article stood in the background of the Bezeq affair.

"No," Mandelblit replied.

Hadad continued and asked whether he knew that investigator Eli Levi printed the article, and later in July copied publications from the Walla website that were mentioned in it.

"No. Is there a point to this? Articles," Mandelblit replied.

Hadad asked: "You didn't give approval to print articles?"

Mandelblit replied: "No."

"I think they set you up in a trap"

Later in the cross-examination, Hadad raised a sharper claim, according to which Mandelblit did not receive full information about the investigative actions in the case.

"I think they set you up in a trap, things they didn't reveal to you," Hadad said.

Mandelblit clarified that he understands from the defense attorney's words that this is a claim of deliberate concealment of information by the prosecution's people.

"You're claiming that the prosecution deliberately hid things from me. The prosecution accompanied these cases," he replied.

Hadad did not retract the claim and said: "You will draw the conclusion in the end. I will lay out the facts for you."

Mandelblit asked to address the claim that recurred, according to him, during the cross-examination, according to which the State Attorney's Office deliberately hid information from him.

"I would be very surprised if this turns out to be true, I am not familiar with a situation where they hid things from me. It's possible, but I'm still not convinced of this," he said.

Background: The testimony on investigation approvals

On the first day of his testimony, Mandelblit confirmed that there were also serious investigative actions that were not approved by him, but explained that the law does not require his approval for every police action.

He also addressed the interrogation exercise operated against state witness Nir Hefetz, which he defined as improper, and explained that he preferred to avoid questioning the investigators for fear that it would harm the handling of the Netanyahu case.

Attorney Amit Hadad, Netanyahu's lawyer (Photo: Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)

On the second day as well, the question of oversight of the investigations remained at the center of the discussion. While Hadad is trying to show that actions related to Case 4000 were carried out without the approval of the attorney general, Mandelblit clarified that he is not familiar with a situation where the prosecution deliberately hid information from him, although he did not completely rule out the possibility.

At this stage, these are claims presented by the defense during cross-examination, and not a judicial determination that the investigative actions were carried out unlawfully.