The panel of judges presiding over Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's corruption trial - Judges Rivka Friedman-Feldman, Moshe Bar-Am, and Oded Shaham - announced Monday that their view regarding the difficulties in proving the bribery charge in Case 4000 remains unchanged even after Netanyahu's cross-examination.
The judges said they have returned to the position they first expressed in June 2023, when they recommended that the State Attorney's Office consider withdrawing the bribery charge in Case 4000.
In that earlier decision, the panel wrote that "there are difficulties in establishing the bribery offense in the first count of the indictment." They therefore suggested that the prosecution consider removing the charge.
The judges emphasized at the time that the recommendation was made "with the necessary caution" after reviewing the evidence presented up to that stage of the trial.
The prosecution responded then that it viewed the evidence differently and claimed that a broader picture would emerge as the proceedings continued.
The judges reiterated their position during a hearing on the court's request to expand Netanyahu's trial schedule to five days a week. Netanyahu attended the hearing despite not being required to do so and voiced his opposition to the proposal.
Defense attorney Amit Haddad, who is representing Netanyahu, argued that his legal team could not handle such a schedule.
"There has never been a trial conducted five days a week except the Eichmann trial," Haddad said. "If the court wants to shorten the proceedings, the solution is not to kill us. We simply cannot do it. I have no way of providing the appropriate defense. We're at the absolute limit."
Attorneys representing the other defendants also opposed increasing the pace of the hearings. Jack Chen, who represents Shaul and Iris Elovitch, said such a decision would "cause real devastation to people's lives," while Sharon Klainman, attorney for Arnon "Noni" Mozes, described the move as "a miscarriage of justice" after long years of legal proceedings.
Netanyahu told the judges that Haddad had warned him about the consequences of the proposed schedule.
"Amit Haddad called me and said, 'We're facing a catastrophe. My small team and I have no way of giving you the defense you deserve [if the trial is held] five days a week,'" Netanyahu recounted.
"We will not give up a single defense witness. They have made baseless claims, and we will refute them," he said, adding that the proceedings have been marked by "distortions of justice that will be written about in the history books."
National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir welcomed the judges' remarks, saying, "This is the second time the judges have told the Attorney General, the State Attorney, and their legal 'Peaky Blinders' group who is running the trial in their name that it's 'game over.' The game is over - there is no bribery. No matter how hard [Attorney General] Gali [Baharav-Miara] and the deep state try, in a democratic country you cannot fabricate cases, you cannot bring down a sitting prime minister and government through threats and intimidation, and you cannot overturn the will of the people through judicial bullying. The prime minister and the national camp will continue to lead the country with the voice of the people and the power of democracy."