The District Court in Jerusalem today rejected the request of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's lawyers to postpone his testimony for two and a half months.
The decision comes despite the war, meaning that the Prime Minister's testimony will begin next month.
To read the full decision [in Hebrew]
Attorney Amit Hadad, who represents Netanyahu, said at the hearing: "We have put in ultimate efforts, day and night, to try and reach the set deadline. Since then there have been endless developments. As far as we are concerned, we asked for the bare minimum. Then we received the state's response. It surprised me as well.”
He added: "If the Prime Minister was serving in the reserve forces, he would have received this without a shadow of a doubt. We are not asking for a consideration due to who Netanyahu is, but we are also not asking for a inconsideration for the same reason. What are they trying to do? Force the Prime Minister to come to court unprepared? Do they want him not to know, not to recognize? What is the order of priority? What is this disruption? We don't want a prime minister who is only involved in the war, and nothing else. There are over 1,000 messages that are just for him."
In response, lawyer Yehudit Tirosh from the Attorney General’s office said: "I cannot imagine that the Prime Minister is not ready to give his testimony. Otherwise his defense attorney would not have submitted the request only two weeks before the date for the testimony."
Hadad replied: "We submitted the request two weeks ago, because we assumed that the prosecution would agree to this, because it knows what is happening in Israel. The Prime Minister is not ready for his testimony. He did not even have time to go through all the pages of his testimony at the police. I am deeply disappointed by the court’s refusal.”
In response, Tirosh said: "The court took the consideration of the war into account. It is a war, there are developments and changes. That was considered. We were given five months to prepare the defense case. We heard from my colleague that he also cannot commit to what will be happening in ten weeks, and a defendant, even if he is the Prime Minister, he cannot dictate what happens in his trial. The war was in an intense stage in July, the north was evacuated, fighting in Gaza. Then the court made a decision and gave a five-month postponement. I don't know where we will all be in another ten weeks. There is no doubt that moving on with the trial is in all of our interests.”".