Police Commissioner Roni Alsheikh on Tuesday defended the use of state's witnesses in the corruption investigations involving Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, saying they are "an imperative tool of police work."
The Israel Police has been criticized for aggressively pursuing state's witnesses in three cases involving the prime minister: Case 1,000, which centers on gifts Netanyahu allegedly received from Hollywood producer Arnon Milchan and Australian billionaire James Packer; Case 2,000, which focuses on an illicit deal Netanyahu allegedly tried to strike with Yedioth Ahronoth publisher Arnon Mozes to obtain more favorable coverage; and Case 4,000, which centers on an alleged deal in which Shaul Elovitch, the controlling shareholder of Israeli telecom corporation Bezeq, ensured positive coverage of the Netanyahu family in the Bezeq-owned Walla news website in exchange for the prime minister promoting government regulations worth hundreds of millions of dollars to the company.
Speaking at the Sderot Conference for Society, Alsheikh refused to answer questions about other potential state's witnesses, saying, "I have no intention of leaking information about who was or is being questioned in the cases involving the prime minister or any other case. I think that's a norm we should all observe."
Police investigators aim "to curtail corruption, not race for a conviction. If we don't curb corruption, we're doing a disservice to society," he said.
"I trust the attorney general. His judgment comprises purely legal and professional considerations. … With all due respect to the police, we can offer a legal analysis [of the evidence] but the attorney general is the one who has to make a decision on whether or not it's right to press charges, and what would best serve the public interest.
"If it turns out that we didn't do our job, that we didn't get to the truth here, then I, personally, will have failed," he said.
Speaking of the use by police of state's witnesses against the prime minister, Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan said on Wednesday that the public must trust the Attorney General's Office and the State Attorney's Office.
"I understand that it [recruiting state's witnesses] creates a sense of unease, as if they are getting away with it [their crimes], because every felon should be made to pay a price," he told Army Radio.
But he stressed that only Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit and State Attorney Shai Nitzan decide on whether to greenlight a state's witness deal, saying, "They and they alone know what these testimonies include and whether they're worth the price. The use of state's witnesses is nothing new, it's just making headlines now, in this context [the investigations involving the prime minister]. The multitude of witnesses and the nature of the deals they make has been raising many questions. But these are questions for the attorney general and the state attorney to answer. Obviously, this was a complex price to pay."
Also on Wednesday, the Movement for Quality Government in Israel called on Mendelblit and Alsheikh to press charges against those who turned state's witnesses against Netanyahu, saying this is in the interest of exhausting the legal processes in these cases.
