Yair Lapid
Yair LapidMiriam Alster/Flash 90

Yesh Atid Chairman Yair Lapid spoke with his party on Monday about Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's investigation.

"The Prime Minister's investigation has taken everything over," Lapid said. "All the truly important things have been pushed aside: the Paris conference, the deal made with Amona's residents, weapon shipments to Hezbollah, public health - everything has suddenly become secondary to the investigation.

"It's not okay, and it's not appropriate. Things cannot continue this way.

"The Prime Minister is innocent until proven guilty, just like any other Israeli citizen. He's innocent. We need to remember and honor that. I understand the process will take time. We need to allow the police to complete the investigation, and we need to allow the Attorney General and the courts to decide on the findings.

"And still, it cannot take too much time. There's a country which needs to be run. We have real problems, and we cannot allow ourselves a Prime Minister who spends more time with his lawyers and being investigated than he spends in cabinet discussions about the Israeli economy. The Attorney General must take this into account.

"This needs to be finished as fast as possible," Lapid declared. "Not just because of the criminal implications, but because of the public and moral implications. Our public lives cannot include recordings of secret conversations and selling the Israeli media. Free press may be annoying, it may make you angry, but it is a basic part of democracy.

"The most dangerous thing for this country and our social contract would be to begin telling ourselves, 'This is how it is. Everyone is corrupt, everyone has personal interests, everyone makes deals in secret rooms.' That's not true. Not everyone is like this. We're not like that.

"There are still moral and caring people in politics and the media. Not everyone is corrupt. And those moral and caring people are the ones who should be running the country," Lapid concluded.