RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://freebeacon.com/blog/high-stakes-for-likud-as-netanyahu-indictment-looms/

The “Bezeq-Walla! Affair,” or Case 4000 as it’s been dubbed by Israeli media, is one of three corruption cases facing Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It’s also the most serious in that everyone, including the prime minister, believes that it will lead to an indictment in the coming weeks—an X factor that could prove fatal to Likud Party hopes in the April 9 elections.

The Israeli police, who recommend indictment, say that Netanyahu helped Israeli tycoon Shaul Elovitch by pushing through the merger of two companies he owned, telecommunications firm Bezeq and satellite TV company Yes. (Elovitch made $269 million on the deal.)

In exchange, Netanyahu and his family would receive favorable news coverage from Walla!, a news site Bezeq owned.

But the closer one looks, the less things add up. According to all those involved, the merger of Bezeq-Yes was done by the book. The head of Israel’s Cable and Satellite Broadcasting Council, Dr. Yifat Ben Hai Segev, who served in the position from 2014-2018, said “There wasn’t any pressure from the side of Netanyahu’s people to approve the merger.”

A realistic evaluation of the key elements which have shaped US-Israel relations, should not focus on the relatively secondary role – regionally and globally – played by the Arab-
Israeli conflict, the Palestinian issue and domestic US politics.

The substantial amplification of the mutually-beneficial US-Israel cooperation – militarily, intelligence-wise, technologically and commercially – has been driven by Israel’s operational, innovative and industrial capabilities, regional (Middle East) and global American interests as well as the rising threat of Islamic terrorism to the US homeland security.

US-Israel relations have been transformed dramatically since 1948, when the State Department, Pentagon and CIA opposed the founding of the Jewish State and prevented the delivery of military supplies to the newly-born state. They claimed that a Jewish state would join the Soviet Bloc, would be wrecked demographically by an eventual Arab majority, would be decimated by the surrounding Arab armies, and would undermine vital US interests in the Middle East. These claims have been demolished by Middle East reality.