A former staffer in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office was the source of the initial intelligence that led police to open an investigation into alleged election interference in the Arab community, Channel 12 News reported on Sunday evening.
Channel 12 Investigative Report
Report: Ex-Netanyahu Aide Planted Evidence
Ilana Dayan's Uvda program alleges that a former staffer in the prime minister's office supplied the intelligence behind the police investigation into alleged election interference in the Arab community.
The report aired on the network's main evening newscast as a preview of an investigation by Uvda, the investigative program hosted by Ilana Dayan. It alleges that the evidence behind the probe was planted by the former employee of the prime minister's office, and that people close to Netanyahu maneuvered police into taking investigative steps as part of a political campaign.
According to the report, the investigation also describes how the campaign built around the message "the Arabs are stealing the elections" came about.
Channel 12 reported that the former staffer supplied the initial intelligence, which was then planted in police computer systems and targeted activists from Ra'am, an Arab political party, in southern Israel.
The report further claims that the intelligence was retrieved on the morning of election day at the direction of Netanyahu's office. According to Channel 12, this led directly to a wave of arrests in the south of the country.
The Uvda investigation also makes a separate allegation about the conduct of Israel's security establishment during the same period. According to the report, Shin Bet chief David Zini demanded that wiretaps be placed on Arab members of Knesset, but the move was blocked at the last minute.
The source report did not include a response from the prime minister's office, the police or the Shin Bet.
