In a first official on-record statement implicating him in the so-called Case 4000 corruption investigation, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was named Tuesday as one of the people believed to have been involved in bribery as part of an illicit deal with the communications giant Bezeq.

Speaking at a hearing in which Shaul Elovitch and Nir Hefetz — the majority shareholder of Bezeq and a former media adviser for the prime minister, respectively — appealed their continued detention in the case, state prosecutor Yehudit Tirosh of the Israel Securities Authority said that in his role as communications minister, Netanyahu was at the center of “a very grave instance of giving and taking bribes.”

The case involves suspicions that Elovitch ordered the Walla news site, which he owns, to grant positive coverage to Netanyahu and his family in exchange for the prime minister advancing regulations benefiting Elovitch.

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Tirosh, arguing before the Tel Aviv Magistrate’s Court, said that “positive coverage is a mild way of putting it.”

“I have no way of properly describing the benefit [he received]. We are talking about enlisting a leading news site to provide adulating coverage in return for regulatory benefits given by the Communications Ministry, the minister of communications and the director-general of the Communications Ministry,” she said.

Netanyahu served as communications minister from November 2014 to February 2017. During that time, Walla’s coverage notably changed to favor the Netanyahu family, and Bezeq was given permission, among other things, to buy the satellite cable provider Yes, overriding antitrust issues, and to renege on its commitment to lease out its infrastructure to telecom competitors so they could provide competing fixed line and internet services.

Suspended Communications Ministry director Shlomo Filber, who turned state witness last week and is expected to provide information possibly incriminating Netanyahu in the probe, had his remand extended by 15 days last Wednesday.

Sources close to Netanyahu, who himself has denied any wrongdoing in the case, rejected claims that the prime minister had sought to help Bezeq as part of a quid pro quo deal.

“The claims against Prime Minister Netanyahu are baseless. All of the decisions were made for relevant reasons and are based on professional opinions, committees and legal advice,” the sources said on Monday.

Tirosh, repeating comments she made at a Monday hearing, said the benefits given to Bezeq were worth “up to a billion shekels ($290 million).”

On Monday, the court released to house arrest four suspects in the case — Elovitch’s wife, Iris; his son, Or; Bezeq CEO Stella Handler; and Bezeq’s deputy CEO for business development, Amikam Shorer — but acceded to a request from the prosecution to keep Elovitch and Hefetz in custody until Sunday.

Arguing Tuesday against overturning that ruling, Tirosh said the state believed that Elovitch and Hefetz would try to obstruct the investigation, even possibly suggesting illicit consultation with Netanyahu himself.

“There is a real suspicion that if the suspects are released today, hugely important investigative work that needs to be carried out in the coming days will be thwarted,” she said.

Netanyahu is expected to be questioned in the case on Friday, “possibly” even under caution as a criminal suspect, a source familiar with the investigation told The Times of Israel earlier this week. If Hefetz and Elovitch were released before then, they could speak with the prime minister before he faces police investigators.

On Sunday, Channel 10 reported that Hefetz and Elovitch had coordinated their version of events and deleted incriminating messages that allegedly linked the favorable coverage Netanyahu received on the Walla news site to the policies that benefited Bezeq.

“We are talking about a real evidence-based suspicion of instances of obstructing the investigation by these two suspects,” Tirosh said in an apparent reference to allegations made in the report.

Elovitch’s and Hefetz’s lawyers argued that leaked text messages between a judge and one of the investigators in the case, appearing to show the two coordinating remand rulings before hearings were even held, invalidated the state’s bid to hold them in custody. A full transcript of the messages released on Monday, however, appeared to be less damning than initially reported — when only a snippet was available — showing that judge Ronit Poznansky-Katz and prosecutor Eran Shacham-Shavit were mainly discussing case logistics.

“We cannot overstate the seriousness of the incident that took place on Sunday,” Yaron Kostelich, Hefetz’s lawyer, told the court, arguing that it deligitmized the prosecution request to remand his client. “We have never seen anything like this is the State of Israel.”

In response, Tirosh, who replaced Shacham-Shavit after the incident, described the incident as “very serious in my eyes, and in the eyes of the state, even after further messages were released,” but said it should not affect the case.

“To say that we are talking about an unlawful detention or that we are talking about damaging the justice process is an exaggeration, especially as the incident is still being clarified,” she said.</s>Nazareth, Israel - The legal noose has tightened sharply around the neck of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as dramatic developments on two fronts last week have left him more exposed than ever.

He is due to be questioned by police in two new corruption probes before he leaves for the United States on Thursday. The question is no longer whether Netanyahu will be forced out of office, but how soon, analysts say.

According to reports in Israeli media, senior figures in Netanyahu's Likud party have started calling him "a dead duck".

Netanyahu's biggest setback is a major crack in what observers have termed his "black box" - an inner circle of loyal confidants and aides.

Shlomo Filber, his former bureau chief, agreed to turn state evidence last week, providing the key to unlock a new and more serious corruption allegation: that the prime minister blocked regulation of Israel's telecoms giant, Bezeq, in return for positive coverage of himself and his family from its news website. Police will question him about his role in the coming days.

Yaron Ezrahi, a political scientist at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, said Filber's agreement last Tuesday to give evidence meant Netanyahu's days in office were now numbered.

"He cannot cling on to power much longer," said Ezrahi.

"His downfall is imminent - either he will have to resign or he will be toppled by a rebellion from within his party or the governing coalition.

"His authority has been seriously dented, and the people who have been protecting him are no longer afraid of him," he told Al Jazeera.

The new development comes in the wake of a police recommendation earlier this month to charge Netanyahu with bribery in two other investigations. He is alleged to have helped leading businessmen in exchange for lavish gifts and media support.

Many members of Netanyahu's inner circle are already under severe pressure from police - several have been arrested - as the prime minister's affairs come under close scrutiny in four separate investigations, with a fifth looming.

Separately, Netanyahu's wife, Sara, is facing a fraud indictment over the way she managed the family's official residence.

But Netanyahu can only be charged if Israel's chief law officer, Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit, approves police findings.

It was widely assumed that Mandelblit, who was appointed by Netanyahu, would drag his feet over whether to charge the prime minister.

But Mandelblit is under growing scrutiny, too, after it emerged that the contest for attorney general in 2015 may have been conditioned on the winner dropping what was then a preliminary investigation into Sara Netanyahu.

Ezrahi said Mandelblit would find it much harder to draw out the proceedings in the current circumstances. "His options to delay bringing charges are pretty much exhausted," he said.

Filber, Netanyahu's former bureau chief, is reportedly the key witness needed by police, seeking to confirm allegations that Netanyahu helped Bezeq in return for favours from its controlling shareholder, Shaul Elovitch.

The suspicion is that Netanyahu parachuted Filber into the top post in the communications ministry to stymie competition reforms that would have severely damaged Bezeq's commercial position.

In exchange, police believe Elovitch offered to provide the prime minister with favourable coverage from Walla, a major online news website he also owned.

The investigation - dubbed Case 4000 - has echoes of another investigation, Case 2000, over which police have already recommended Netanyahu be charged with bribery.

In that case, Netanyahu was taped apparently cutting a deal with Arnon Mozes, owner of Israel's influential Yedioth Ahronoth news group. The Israeli prime minister is heard suggesting legislation to weaken a rival newspaper, Israel Hayom, in return for positive coverage from Yedioth to help him stay in power.

Police have also recommended Netanyahu be charged in Case 1000, in which he is suspected of receiving nearly $300,000 in gifts from businessmen, in return for lessening their tax bills and providing them with investment opportunities.

A fourth investigation, Case 3000, has so far implicated a large number of Netanyahu's aides and former advisers, though not yet directly the prime minister. They are suspected of receiving bribes from a $2bn deal with a German manufacturer of Dolphin submarines, which are capable of carrying nuclear warheads.

Ezrahi said there were strong suspicions that Netanyahu could not have been ignorant of such kickbacks, given the national security implications of the subs' purchase. He is expected to be questioned about his role in the affair this week.

Ben Caspit, who has been at the forefront of reporting developments in the various investigations, observed last week that Filber's cooperation with the police on Netanyahu's telecom investigation could "open a bottomless Pandora's box".

A theme emerging from the investigations is Netanyahu's apparently increasingly desperate efforts to rig the Israeli media in his favour, to maintain his grip on power.

Yossi Alpher, who served as an adviser to Ehud Barak, a former Israeli prime minister, noted after the 2015 general election Netanyahu reserved the post of communications minister for himself. As part of a coalition pact, he insisted his coalition partners approve any decisions he made in that capacity.

"It looks very much like he was seeking near-complete control over the Israeli media and his public image," Alpher told Al Jazeera.

As well as allegedly making secret deals with the businessmen behind leading newspapers and websites, Netanyahu threatened punitive moves against Israel's two largest commercial broadcasters, Channels 2 and 10.

He also sought to move control of the popular Army Radio to the defence ministry, making it easier for the government to interfere in its coverage.

Senior journalists coming forward to tell of how they were leaned on to provide uncritical coverage of the Netanyahus have strengthened suspicions of meddling.

Last week, it was reported that Ilan Yeshua, chief executive officer of the Walla news website, had handed over to police recordings of Elovitch, Bezeq's majority shareholder, demanding he slant coverage to help Netanyahu.

In an indication of how entangled the various investigations are becoming, Netanyahu reportedly wanted Walla's chief editor, Aviram Elad, sacked for publishing a report into improprieties in another investigation - the purchase of the Dolphin subs.

According to Alpher, the cases piling up are an indication of the extent of Netanyahu's "megalomania.

"What they highlight is a catastrophic combination of ego, instinct for survival and political paranoia," said Alpher.

So far, Netanyahu has held on to power because his core supporters have been unmoved by the mounting evidence against him.

A poll after last week's revelations showed his party would still win the biggest share of seats if parliamentary elections were called.

Netanyahu has claimed he is the victim of police persecution.

Last week, Likud legislators unsuccessfully tried to mount a full-frontal attack on the right-wing police commander Roni Alsheikh at an interior committee hearing. The legislators accused Alsheikh's force of carrying out a politically motivated "coup" against the prime minister.

According to Haaretz analyst Amos Harel, the public assault on Alsheikh was intended as a warning to Mandelblit, the attorney general, of what lay in store for him if he moved to charge Netanyahu.

But the attorney general is now under greater pressure to act decisively, after he found himself implicated in a potential new scandal.

It emerged last week that, in 2015, Hila Gerstl, a former judge, was approached by Nir Hefetz, Netanyahu's former media adviser, offering her the post of attorney general if she promised to close legal proceedings against Sara Netanyahu.

That has left a dark cloud over Mandelblit, a former cabinet secretary for Netanyahu, who got the job instead. It raises concerns about how much Netanyahu interfered in the appointment and whether Mandelblit was offered - and agreed to - a similar deal.

The Israeli media has questioned whether Mandelblit himself should be investigated and whether, as a result, he should recuse himself from the other Netanyahu investigations.

In a statement last week, Netanyahu dismissed the report about Hefetz, saying his adviser "never made such a ludicrous offer".

Alpher, the former adviser to Ehud Barak, said Netanyahu had no choice but present a public image of "business as usual", but that, behind the scenes, his options were narrowing.

He could resign, as his predecessor Ehud Olmert did, to concentrate on his defence; seek a plea deal in the hope he would avoid prison time in return for his resignation; or call new elections while he still has popular support.

"The last option would be risky. It would probably make no difference to his fate, if the legal case is as solid as it looks. And there is the chance it would spur more revelations."

Jamal Zahalka, a Palestinian member of the Knesset for the Joint List, said Netanyahu's indictment for financial irregularities should be compared to the American gangster Al Capone's conviction for tax evasion in the early 1930s.

"Netanyahu has committed crimes against humanity and is responsible during his premiership for the deaths of innumerable Palestinians," he told Al Jazeera.

"He should be tried for those crimes, not for his appetite for expensive cigars and champagne."</s>More than 1,500 protesters gathered in central Tel Aviv on Saturday demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over corruption allegations.

Israeli police recently recommended that charges be brought against Netanyahu for bribery, fraud and breach of trust

Netanyahu’s days in office are starting to look numbered as police investigate two new corruption probes. Senior figures in Netanyahu’s Likud party have started calling him “a dead duck”, according to Israeli media reports.

RT reports: The “Bibi Netanyahu go home” slogan once again united the Israeli crowd holding their weekly anti-government corruption protest in Tel Aviv. Waving signs that read “Bibi, you are not above the law,”“Love Israel, separate from Netanyahu,” they chanted, “A mafia country and a corrupt Prime Minister.”

Earlier this month Israeli police recommended that Benjamin Netanyahu be indicted over allegations of bribery, fraud and breach of trust. Despite the pressure and daily calls to resign, Netanyahu maintains his innocence, further exacerbating the public anger.

“In the past, whenever there was an indictment recommendation with the police, politicians used to resign,” one protester told RT’s Ruptly video agency. “It’s very difficult to see Bibi resigning. He’s not the kind of [person] who resigns.”

“I came here to protest and to defend the democracy in Israel because it’s important that people will fight corruption wherever it is because the government here forgot that they need to serve us and not we need to serve them,” noted another activist present at the rally.

Police earlier announced that they gathered sufficient evidence to start legal proceedings against the premier in two separate probes – Case 1000 and Case 2000. Although the recommendations were submitted to the attorney general, it may take months before the decision is made.

Case 1000 alleges that Netanyahu, along with his wife Sara, received lavish gifts worth thousands of dollars from Hollywood producer Arnon Milchan and Australian billionaire James Packer, in exchange for favors. The other probe revolves around suspicions of Netanyahu conspiring with the owner of the top-selling Israeli newspaper, Arnon Mozes, to get a more positive coverage of himself. The Prime Minister has repeatedly denied the allegations as “baseless.”</s>JERUSALEM (AP) — An Israeli court on Monday released four of seven suspects held in a high-profile corruption case involving Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s inner circle, amid an uproar over a judge apparently discussing their detention with an investigator in private.

Israeli media reported late Sunday that Tel Aviv Magistrate Court Judge Ronit Poznanski-Katz and securities investigator Eran Shaham-Shavit exchanged text messages discussing extending the detention of several suspects in the investigation involving Israel’s telecom giant Bezeq and the close confidants of Netanyahu. Poznanski-Katz was removed from the case after critics decried the exchange as an obstruction of justice, and Netanyahu backers pounced on it as part of their claim that the authorities were out to get the long-time premier.

Last week police arrested seven suspects for their alleged involvement in the promotion of regulation worth hundreds of millions of dollars to Israel’s Bezeq telecom company in return for Bezeq’s popular news site, Walla, allegedly providing favorable coverage of Netanyahu and his family.

Former Netanyahu media adviser Nir Hefetz and Shlomo Filber, the former director of the Communications Ministry under Netanyahu, were arrested, as well as Bezeq boss Shaul Elovitch, his son and his wife and two top Bezeq executives. Hefetz, Filber and Elovitch remain in custody.

Filber, one of the closest people to Netanyahu, has reportedly turned state witness and will incriminate Netanyahu in the affair.

But the sense of peril to Netanyahu’s rule took a step back Sunday, with the evening news report Sunday about the illicit conversation. Shortly after, the head of the Tel Aviv Magistrate Court removed Poznanski-Katz from the case, and the justice minister and Supreme Court president jointly requested an investigation into the report. Netanyahu allies are calling for a criminal investigation into possible breach of trust and obstruction of justice by the judge and prosecutor.

The defense attorneys for the suspects in the case demanded their immediate release. On Monday, the Tel Aviv court ordered Elovitch’s son released from custody, and released Elovitch’s wife and the two Bezeq executives to house arrest.

The judge and prosecutor’s exchange on the WhatsApp messaging service appeared to play into Netanyahu’s claims that police investigations into his alleged corruption were part of a witch hunt by the media and law enforcement. Coalition whip David Amsalem, a member of Netanyahu’s ruling Likud party, told Israel’s Army Radio on Monday that the police were “obsessively” chasing after the prime minister and called for an investigation into the justice system.

Netanyahu is not directly implicated in the Bezeq corruption case, also known as Case 4000, but is expected to be questioned by police on the matter later this week. Police have recommended indicting Netanyahu on corruption charges in two other cases, one involving accepting gifts from billionaire friends, and the second over trading positive media coverage for advantageous legislation for a newspaper.

The prime minister has denied any wrongdoing.</s>In an article published in Al-Monitor without a single verifiable citation, Israeli journalist, Shlomi Eldar, went to unprecedented lengths to divert attention from the corruption in his country.

He spoke of Palestinian journalists - all speaking on condition of anonymity - who 'applauded' and 'admired' Israeli media coverage of corruption scandals surrounding the country's rightwing Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

The Israeli media, which has largely supported Netanyahu's devastating wars on Gaza, continues to relentlessly defend the illegal occupation of Palestine and to serve as a shield for Israel's stained reputation on the international stage. It is hardly praiseworthy, even if it arguably provides decent coverage for the Netanyahu investigations.

For an Israeli journalist to handpick a few Palestinians who, allegedly, praised the war crimes-apologist Israeli media is a remarkable event that surely cannot be satisfactorily addressed in anonymity.

But Eldar's journalism aside, one would think that seeking Palestinian admiration for Israeli media should be the least urgent question to address at this time. Others are far more pressing. For example:

Is corruption among Israel’s political elite symptomatic of greater moral and other forms of corruption that have afflicted the entire society?

And, why is it that, while Netanyahu is being indicted for bribery, no Israeli official is ever indicted for war crimes against Palestinians?

In fact, well before Netanyahu's corruption scandals included more serious charges – for instance, quid pro quo deals in which his advisors tried to manipulate media coverage in his favor and offering high political positions in exchange for favors - it included bribes pertaining to fancy cigars and expensive drinks.

What Israelis are trying to tell us is that, despite all of its problems, Israel is a good, transparent, law-abiding and democratic society.

This is precisely why Eldar wrote his article. The outcome was a familiar act of intellectual hubris that we have grown familiar with.

Eldar even cites a supposedly former Palestinian prisoner who told Al-Monitor that, while in prison, "we learned how the democratic election process works in Israel. The prisoners adopted the system in order to elect their leadership in a totally democratic fashion, while ensuring freedom of choice."

Others cited their favorite Israeli journalist, some of whom have served and continue to serve as mouthpieces for official Israeli hasbara (propaganda).

Many of Israel's friends in western governments and corporate media have also contributed to this opportunistic style of journalism; they come to the rescue when times are hard, to find ways to praise Israel and to chastise Palestinians and Arabs, even if the latter are not relevant to the discussion, whatsoever.

Who could ever forget US Senator John McCain’s criticism of his country's torture of prisoners at the height of the so-called ‘war on terror’? His rationale was that such a war can be won without torture, because Israel 'doesn't torture' and yet it is capable of combating ‘Palestinian terrorism’.

Thousands of Palestinians have been tortured, and hundreds were killed under duress in Israeli prisons, the last of whom was Yaseen Omar on the day when this article was written. Moreover, according to the Palestinians Prisoners' Club, 60% of Palestinian children arrested by Israel are also tortured.

If Israeli media was truly honest in its depiction of Netanyahu's corruption, it would have made a point of highlighting the extent to which corruption goes well beyond the prime minister, his wife and a few close confidantes, but this would pierce through the entire legal, political and business establishment rendering the system itself as rotten and corrupt.

Instead, the heart of the discussion is relocated somewhere else entirely. In Eldar's article, for example, he quotes the anonymous Palestinian who speaks about how Palestinians prisoners "rejected the political systems of Arab states and opted for the one they had absorbed from the 'Israeli enemy'."

This Israeli obsession of diverting from the discussion is an old tactic. Whenever Israel is in the dock for whatever problem it has invited upon others or itself, it immediately fashions an Arab enemy to beat down, chastise and blame.

In the final analysis, somehow Israel maintains the upper hand and self-granted moral ascendency.

This is also why Israelis refer to their country as "the only democracy in the Middle East". It is a defense mechanism to divert from the fact that apartheid, racially-structured political systems are inherently undemocratic. So, Israel resorts to belittling its neighbors to confirm its own self-worth.

When Israel facilitated and helped carry out the Sabra and Shatila Massacre in Lebanon in September 1982, it used the same logic to defend itself against media outrage.

The then Israeli Prime Minister, Menachem Begin, was quoted as saying "the goyim kill goyim, and they blame the Jews." By 'they' he meant the media.

The bottom line is always this: Israel is blameless no matter the hideousness of the act; it is superior and more civilized, and, according to Eldar's selective reporting, even Palestinians know it.

But where is the outrage by Eldar and his Israeli media champions as thousands of black men and women are being caged in by Israeli police, ready for deportation, for committing the mortal sin of daring to escape war in their countries and seeking refuge in Israel?

How about the millions of besieged and subjugated Palestinians living a bitter existence under an inhumane military occupation?

Should not the Israeli media be targeting the very legal and political structures in their country that makes it okay to imprison a whole nation in defiance of international and human rights law?

In some strange way, corruption is one of few things that is truly normal about Israel, for it is a shared quality with every single country in the world.

What is not normal, and should never be normalized, is that Israel is the only country in the world that continues to practice Apartheid, many years after it was disbanded in South Africa.

Israeli media would rather delay that discussion indefinitely, a cowardly act that is neither admirable nor praiseworthy.</s>Israeli MP Benjamin Netanyahu, already under investigation for two instances of corruption, may complete a hat-trick. A state prosecutor has named Netanyahu as the beneficiary of a PR scheme worth "up to a billion shekels."These are being addressed in two separate investigations, known as Case 1000 and Case 2000.However, the Israeli leader now risks being dragged into another scandal-ridden investigation - Case 4000 -. Alongside his ongoing tenure as Prime Minister, Netanyahu also served as the country's communications minister from 2014 to 2017. As such he directly benefited from the alleged deal, state prosecutor Yehudit Tirosh said in a hearing on Tuesday."I have no way of properly describing the benefit [he received].," Tirosh said.Both the majority shareholder of Bezeq, Shaul Elovitch, and a disgraced former media adviser to Netanyahu, Nir Hefetz, are being held in custody. As Elovitch and Hefetz appealed their detention on Tuesday, state prosecution argued that if they are released they might conspire to derail the investigation.Insisting that the two must be kept behind bars, the state prosecutor, as cited by the Times of Israel, said that "there is a real suspicion that if the suspects are released today, hugely important investigative work that needs to be carried out in the coming days will be thwarted."She was possibly referring to the upcoming questioning of Netanyahu, who is set to testify before the court on Friday. There have been concerns the alleged co-conspirators might seek to coordinate their actions with Netanyahu if their request is granted.An alleged agreement between Bezeq and Netanyahu's media adviser at the time focused on Israeli website Walla's coverage of Netanyahu and his family. The website, which is owned by Bezeq, appeared to change its take on Netanyahu, portraying him in a more positive light during the time he was communications minister.Several other suspects, among them the telecom mogul's family members and staff, have been placed under house arrest.Over the weekend, the investigation itself became a source of controversy after messages leaked to the Israeli media between the presiding judge and one of the investigators, hinting at possible coordination. Although the texts, released on Sunday, referred mostly to logistics issues and not the essence of the case, the judge and the investigator were both removed from the investigation. The court on Tuesday refused to consider it as a legitimate reason for releasing Elovitch and Hefetz, with the state prosecutor arguing that the incident had not damaged the judicial process and that the detention of the suspects was in line with the proceedings.Netanyahu spoke defiantly in the face of the accusations against him that seem to have piled up in recent months. On Monday, the PM issued a statement defending his decision as communications minister to let Bezeq buy a satellite cable provider, which some viewed as a breach of anti-trust laws. Arguing that all the decisions concerning the telecommunications giant were made by him in a "professional manner" and involved no conflict of interest, Netanyahu slammed the investigation as a "scandal" and a "witch hunt that has been going on for years.""Every day the numbers are rising. At first they were talking about tens of millions, then hundreds of millions. Today is one billion, and tomorrow one trillion. But the truth will win, and the hot air will blow out of this balloon - because there was nothing," he said Netanyahu also denies any wrongdoing in cases 1000 and 2000. The first alleges that the Israeli leader and his wife received luxury gifts from two billionaire acquaintances in exchange for favors. The second revolves around suspicions Netanyahu had struck a quid pro quo deal with a top-selling newspaper.Israelis, who have been rallying against "Crime Minister" Netanyahu on the streets every Saturday since December 2016, appear to believe the police over the PM, according to a recent poll by Reshet TV which found than only a quarter side with Netanyahu and almost half with the police.</s>An Israeli court has released four of the seven suspects held in a high-profile corruption case involving Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's confidants after a judge apparently discussed their detention with an investigator.

The development leaves two Netanyahu aides — Nir Hefetz, the premier's former media adviser, and Communications Ministry Director Shlomo Filber — and media tycoon Shaul Elovitch in jail.

Israeli media reported late on Sunday that Tel Aviv District Court Judge Ronit Poznanski-Katz and an investigator from the security agencies exchanged messages about the suspects held in a case involving Netanyahu's aides and telecom giant Bezeq.

Last week police arrested Elovitch and the others over involvement in promoting regulations worth hundreds of millions of dollars to Israel's Bezeq telecom company, of which Elovitch is a major shareholder.</s>What a tragedy: During the week in which Benjamin Netanyahu enjoyed his greatest achievement as prime minister – the announcement of the transfer of the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem this May – he is expected to undergo his harshest questioning yet as a criminal suspect.

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The brilliant diplomat, during whose term the 70-year boycott of the recognition of Israel’s capital was broken without any payment in return, will meet with Israel Police’s financial crimes investigators, in an attempt to extricate himself from bribery suspicions in the Bezeq affair (what the police call Case 4000) and the niggling questions in the submarines affair (Case 3000).

It’s hard not to revisit the comparison (which has already become a cliché) between Netanyahu and Richard Nixon, who ran into trouble in the Watergate affair just months after he returned from his trip to China – the greatest achievement of American diplomacy in decades, and which ultimately led to the United States winning the Cold War.

>> The final days of Benjamin Netanyahu's rule / Analysis ■ Netanyahu won't quit – even if indicted / Analysis ■ What happens to Netanyahu now? Three scenarios

It will be fascinating to read the biographies that will be written, and watch the series to be produced in another decade or two, when more and more details have emerged about what happened in the past few years in Netanyahu’s court.

His confidants are being arrested, state’s witness deals are being signed, and yet it is still hard to believe: Is it possible that the prime minister, whose intellectual and analytic abilities are beyond dispute, really risked his career – and maybe even his freedom and financial future – for only a few pretty pictures of his wife Sara on the homepage of the Walla website? For adoring headlines in the gossip columns? To soften the criticism of the Yedioth Ahronoth group about him? To masquerade as a millionaire who smokes expensive cigars and eats takeaway food from gourmet restaurants whenever he feels like it? Will he blame it on Sara and claim that all he wanted was to satisfy her whims?

According to the most recent polls, the Israeli public thinks Netanyahu is corrupt but is afraid of losing him. For nine years, the public has not considered anyone except Netanyahu as a proper leader. The investigations have not changed anything, and have not put any serious contender on the field to succeed him. The reason is not just the tribal unity of members of his Likud party against the “left and elites” that control the legal system and defense establishment (which is the common belief). Netanyahu’s popularity rests primarily on his achievements – and we must not take them lightly.

His most important achievement is his success in insulating most Israelis – who live the “Israeli” side of the Green Line – from the menace of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The security threat, which throughout most of Israel’s existence was a daily burden that overshadowed everything, was pushed to the margins of the public discourse. Palestinian terrorism, to the extent that it exists at all, is focused on the West Bank and East Jerusalem – in other words, in places where most Israelis never go.

This is not just leftism: Many people don’t want to retreat a single millimeter from the territories or move even a single family of settlers from their homes, but they don’t know where Halamish or Har Bracha are – and it doesn’t interest them, either. The terrorist attacks there don’t endanger them.

During Netanyahu’s time, the smallest number of funerals, relatively, has been recorded on the Israeli side of the conflict. He proved that it is possible to conduct an “economic peace” and enjoy international support even without giving up the territories, as opposed to the axiom accepted here for many decades.

He made some serious mistakes, first and foremost being dragged into the Gaza war in the summer of 2014 (Operation Protective Edge), and the delay in recognizing the warning signs concerning restrictions on the Israel Defense Forces’ freedom of action in Syria – which Israel paid for with the shooting down of its F-16 two weeks ago.

Not everything is his doing, of course: Netanyahu’s policies benefited from the Arab Spring that shattered neighboring countries; the collapse of the Palestinian national movement; and the results of the discovery of oil in the United States, which weakened U.S. involvement in the region and its motivation – if it ever really existed – to impose a peace agreement based on an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank and Golan Heights.

Netanyahu’s second big achievement is political stability. In the decade that passed since his defeat in the 1999 Knesset election and until his return to power, three prime ministers replaced one another here. In the decade before that, four prime ministers replaced each other.

Since Netanyahu’s comeback in 2009, changes in the governing coalition and bureaus of senior ministers have been recorded, and Netanyahu has dealt with and is dealing with regular threats to his job. But a maneuver here, a move in the other direction there – and at the top the same person has remained standing for nine years. It’s reminiscent of the eradication of hyperinflation here in the 1980s.

The third achievement is economic prosperity, which is expressed in a jump in private consumption and a feeling of stability. The caveats here are well-known: Not everything is because of Netanyahu (the falling price of oil led to lower costs for overseas flights, etc.); housing prices are still high; social inequality is still great; the education system is in bad shape; corruption is common; and the budget deficit is ballooning. But enough Israelis are enjoying the present situation and aren’t anxious to risk a change. And since Netanyahu would have been stoned to death if the economy had hit a crisis, he is likewise now benefiting from people’s sense of satisfaction and stability.

As long as this situation lasts – the security respite, stable leadership and the feeling of prosperity – many Israelis will follow Netanyahu’s meetings with his police investigators with trepidation, even if they believe he is guilty.</s>Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is to be questioned as a suspect in a further case of alleged corruption and as a witness in another, Israeli media reported Sunday.

The police, who have questioned the prime minister seven times since the beginning of 2017, in mid-February recommended the premier be indicted for graft, fraud and breach of trust in two other cases.

The cases have fuelled speculation he could be forced to step down or call an early election.

Public radio and television on Sunday reported he would be questioned on Friday as a suspect in alleged attempts to seek positive media coverage through favours to telecommunications giant Bezeq.

He would also face interrogation as a witness in suspected corruption around Israel’s purchase of three submarines from German industrial giant ThyssenKrupp.

A police spokesperson could not immediately confirm the reports.

The Bezeq case involves the main shareholder of Israel’s top communications group, Shaul Elovitch and his wife, as well as group CEO Stella Handler and four others who were arrested in mid-February.

According to press reports, investigators are focusing on allegations that Shaul Elovitch, Bezeq’s controlling shareholder, gave Netanyahu positive coverage on his Walla! news site in exchange for policies benefiting the business.

Shlomo Filber, a Netanyahu ally for more than 20 years and former director general of the communications ministry, is expected to agree to turn state witness in exchange for avoiding jail, according to Israeli media reports confirmed by police.

A gag order prevented publishing any details of the deal.

Filber is suspected of mediating between Netanyahu and Elovitch and promoting regulatory changes worth millions to Bezeq.

The police on Sunday also extended the custody of Eli Kamir, a communications adviser suspected of being involved in the Bezeq case.

Kamir is also suspected, alongside Nir Hefetz, a fellow former media adviser to the Netanyahu family, of offering a judge promotion in exchange for dropping a case against the premier’s wife over alleged misuse of public funds.

The police have already recommended Netanyahu’s indictment in two cases.

In one, he and family members are suspected of receiving one million shekels ($285,000, 230,000 euros) of luxury cigars, champagne and jewellery from wealthy personalities in exchange for financial or personal favours.

In the other case, investigators suspect the premier of trying to reach an agreement with the owner of Yediot Aharonot, a top Israeli daily newspaper, for more favourable coverage.

The decision on whether or not to indict him now rests with the attorney general.</s>Case by Case: Did Netanyahu Really Say That

How much have you been paying attention to Netanyahu's protestations of innocence with the Israeli police circling around him? Find out here
The Israeli Prosecutor's Office links Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a corruption case.