Ex-law enforcement officials and judges pile harsh criticism on Ohana, Netanyahu
ex-top law enforcement and judicial officials piled on acting justice minister amir ohana and prime minister benjamin netanyahu with unprecedented criticism on thursday, at the israel bar association conference in haifa.
Former supreme Court chief justice dorit beinisch slammed ohana as the leader of incitement against the judicial establishment, while former state attorney moshe lador said that netanyahu is operating in a constant conflict of interest of putting his fight to clear his name from criminal corruption allegations before the needs of the nation.
lador added that netanyahu had appointed ohana to attack law enforcement and not because he was qualified for the job of justice minister.
While many current officials, like attorney-General avichai mandelblit and state attorney shai nitzan, absented themselves from the conference (officially to attend more meetings to decide netanyahu’s fate, but unofficially it appeared to avoid a media storm), current supreme Court justice menachem mazuz said that ohana’s attacks on the legal establishment were very problematic.
part of what was unusual about these attacks were the direct references to ohana, whereas in the past criticism of justice ministers by judicial establishment officials was implied, but avoided direct naming.
ohana has faced a new level of counterattacks from the legal establishment since he violated a court-ordered gag order earlier this month relating to state’s witness nir hefetz and the netanyahu cases.
in that same speech, the acting justice minister also accused the prosecution of operating an illegal deep state within its walls that was meant to carry out political change that could not be achieved at the polls.
ohana offered no evidence of this deep state besides the cases against netanyahu, and three examples of prosecutors who committed crimes out of thousands who have served the state prosecution in recent decades.
earlier thursday at the conference, former police chief roni alsheich expressed disillusionment with “the politicization of everything,” leading to a situation in which people think “if you are on the right you need to be against law enforcement, and if you are left, you need to be for it. this is a grave threat” to the country.
alsheich, who stepped down in december 2018 and has not had a permanent replacement to date, was arguing that political fighting over netanyahu’s case and other issues have ruined the bi-partisan support for law enforcement that is crucial for the country to function.
he argued that there was no alternative to the police and other official law enforcement agencies protecting the country from crime and corruption, and that those attacking law enforcement needed to internalize this as a basic civics lesson.
the comment itself carries some irony as alsheich’s personal politics are considered to be right-wing.
alsheich also attacked the current situation in which moti Cohen has been the acting police chief for nearly a year without the government being able to formalize a permanent chief.
even as the current situation is partially due to there not being a permanent government since march, alsheich said the temporary chief could not act independently as the state needed.
some on the left have argued that netanyahu’s refusal to step down despite the corruption charges against him are responsible for holding up the appointment of a permanent chief and other similar issues.
alsheich was close with netanyahu when he was appointed, and early in his term even made efforts to protect the prime minister and sarah from any embarrassing situations. but by the end of his term he was viewed by the prime minister as an enemy for endorsing the bribery charges against him.