Attorney-General Elyakim Rubenstein has ordered the police to investigate irregularities in the Labor Party primaries. The Movement for Quality in Government demanded that testimonies by Labor members that they voted more than once be looked into, as well as suspicions of forgeries in the Druze sector. Haifa Likud activist Aviad Visuly told Arutz-7 said that Rubenstein had employed a double standard when he froze no fewer than seven criminal investigations into Labor Party leader Amram Mitzna's campaign practices.
Ynet, a Hebrew internet news site owned by Israel's largest daily, Yediot Acharonot, as of this morning had featured the story of the criminal investigation in the Likud on its front page for a large part of the preceding 24 hours. This is in sharp departure with its usual practice of changing the top story at least once or twice an hour. The other news outlets also refuse to let the story die; Voice of Israel Radio has featured it in various forms for a number of days, and today features allegations by Ayoub Kara - in position #39 on the Likud list of Knesset candidates (he was 19 last time) - that he was asked to pay thousands of dollars for dozens of Central Committee votes.
Former Labor MK Haggai Merom wrote an article on Ynet yesterday warning Labor not to be too vocal against Likud corruption, "because it will boomerang against you." Excerpts:
"The Likud will be revealed in all its nakedness regarding its corrupt and seductive system primaries that invited party activists to offer bribes and the like... but people like [leading Likud members] Mickey Eitan, Limor Livnat, Meir Shitreet and others won't sit back quietly. They'll pull out all their ammunition they've stored up [against Labor] regarding investigations by the State Comptroller and the State Investigative Unit about corruption and allegations in the story of Ehud Barak's associations [and more]... Among the Laborites to be accused will be Yitzchak Herzog, who was elected to the 10th spot on the party list and who maintained silence during the investigation on issues such as the associations scandal, the transfer of monies from abroad to Israel in various indirect ways, and the funneling of monies to dummy activists hired by Ehud Barak to help him win the election..."
Arutz-7's Haggai Segal asked Merom today the secret of his seeming prophetic abilities. "It was clear that this would happen," Merom said modestly, "because of the dynamics involved. It had to be obvious that the Attorney-General couldn't allow himself to investigate just one side - and especially in view of very questionable things that actually happened in the last Labor elections [between Burg and Ben-Eliezer]... It was obvious that Labor couldn't come out much cleaner than Likud..."
Merom wrote yesterday that the small parties will gain from these developments, "because the Israeli citizen is sick of the lack of ethics in the larger parties, and he certainly has other alternatives..." He said that he is not saying that suspicions of corruption should not be investigated: "On the contrary, they must be uprooted from the source. My point is just that if someone thinks that he won't get wet in this rainfall, he is mistaken; the raindrops will most certainly drip onto his shoulders, and then down onto his pants."
Ynet, a Hebrew internet news site owned by Israel's largest daily, Yediot Acharonot, as of this morning had featured the story of the criminal investigation in the Likud on its front page for a large part of the preceding 24 hours. This is in sharp departure with its usual practice of changing the top story at least once or twice an hour. The other news outlets also refuse to let the story die; Voice of Israel Radio has featured it in various forms for a number of days, and today features allegations by Ayoub Kara - in position #39 on the Likud list of Knesset candidates (he was 19 last time) - that he was asked to pay thousands of dollars for dozens of Central Committee votes.
Former Labor MK Haggai Merom wrote an article on Ynet yesterday warning Labor not to be too vocal against Likud corruption, "because it will boomerang against you." Excerpts:
"The Likud will be revealed in all its nakedness regarding its corrupt and seductive system primaries that invited party activists to offer bribes and the like... but people like [leading Likud members] Mickey Eitan, Limor Livnat, Meir Shitreet and others won't sit back quietly. They'll pull out all their ammunition they've stored up [against Labor] regarding investigations by the State Comptroller and the State Investigative Unit about corruption and allegations in the story of Ehud Barak's associations [and more]... Among the Laborites to be accused will be Yitzchak Herzog, who was elected to the 10th spot on the party list and who maintained silence during the investigation on issues such as the associations scandal, the transfer of monies from abroad to Israel in various indirect ways, and the funneling of monies to dummy activists hired by Ehud Barak to help him win the election..."
Arutz-7's Haggai Segal asked Merom today the secret of his seeming prophetic abilities. "It was clear that this would happen," Merom said modestly, "because of the dynamics involved. It had to be obvious that the Attorney-General couldn't allow himself to investigate just one side - and especially in view of very questionable things that actually happened in the last Labor elections [between Burg and Ben-Eliezer]... It was obvious that Labor couldn't come out much cleaner than Likud..."
Merom wrote yesterday that the small parties will gain from these developments, "because the Israeli citizen is sick of the lack of ethics in the larger parties, and he certainly has other alternatives..." He said that he is not saying that suspicions of corruption should not be investigated: "On the contrary, they must be uprooted from the source. My point is just that if someone thinks that he won't get wet in this rainfall, he is mistaken; the raindrops will most certainly drip onto his shoulders, and then down onto his pants."