JERUSALEM: Police questioned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday for the second time over allegations that he improperly accepted gifts from wealthy supporters
The police department is pressing ahead with an investigation that has threatened to challenge his long leadership of Israel’s government. Netanyahu has adamantly denied wrongdoing.
Police said investigators went to Netanyahu’s official residence in Jerusalem in a case that local media say arose from allegations involving high-profile figures in international business and Hollywood.
Police said investigators questioned Netanyahu for five hours about suspicions that he “allegedly received benefits” as well as about another undisclosed affair. His questioning on Monday lasted more than three hours.
Few details of the allegations against Netanyahu have been officially released, with Israel’s Justice Ministry revealing only that the prime minister was being questioned “on suspicion of receiving benefits from business people.”
But Israeli media have reported that Netanyahu accepted “favors” from businessmen in Israel and abroad, allegedly including billionaire Ronald Lauder and Hollywood producer Arnon Milchan.
Israeli Channel 2 TV has said Netanyahu is the central suspect in a second investigation that also involves family members.
Netanyahu has repeatedly denied wrongdoing, portraying the accusations as a witch hunt against him and his family by a hostile media opposed to his hard-line political views.
He has pointed to previous suspicions raised against him, none of which resulted in any criminal proceedings, as a sign that he has done nothing wrong in this most recent allegation as well. “There won’t be anything because there is nothing,” Netanyahu has said frequently.
Serving his third consecutive term with a stable coalition government, Netanyahu is on track to become Israel’s longest-serving leader, should he complete his full term in office in 2019. He does not appear to have any serious foreseeable challenger to his rule.
While the probe is still in its infancy, a mounting investigation could put pressure on Netanyahu to step down. His predecessor, Ehud Olmert, did so in 2008 just months before he was formally indicted on corruption-related charges. Olmert is now serving a prison sentence after being convicted of accepting bribes.
After eight years in office, in addition to an earlier term in the 1990s, Netanyahu has garnered a reputation as a cognac-swilling, cigar-puffing socialite who is as comfortable rubbing shoulders with international celebrities as he is making deals in Parliament.
Scandals have dogged him and his wife, Sara, over their lavish tastes.
They have been chided for excessive spending on anything from pistachio ice cream to scented candles to ringing up $127,000 in public funds for a special sleeping cabin for a five-hour flight to London.
Police question Netanyahu again over corruption suspicion
Police question Netanyahu again over corruption suspicion
Italian police fire tear gas as protesters clash near Winter Olympics hockey venue
- Police vans behind a temporary metal fence secured the road to the athletes’ village, but the protest veered away, continuing on a trajectory toward the Santagiulia venue
MILAN: Italian police fired tear gas and a water cannon at dozens of protesters who threw firecrackers and tried to access a highway near a Winter Olympics venue on Saturday.
The brief confrontation came at the end of a peaceful march by thousands against the environmental impact of the Games and the presence of US agents in Italy.
Police held off the violent demonstrators, who appeared to be trying to reach the Santagiulia Olympic ice hockey rink, after the skirmish. By then, the larger peaceful protest, including families with small children and students, had dispersed.
Earlier, a group of masked protesters had set off smoke bombs and firecrackers on a bridge overlooking a construction site about 800 meters (a half-mile) from the Olympic Village that’s housing around 1,500 athletes.
Police vans behind a temporary metal fence secured the road to the athletes’ village, but the protest veered away, continuing on a trajectory toward the Santagiulia venue. A heavy police presence guarded the entire route.
There was no indication that the protest and resulting road closure interfered with athletes’ transfers to their events, all on the outskirts of Milan.
The demonstration coincided with US Vice President JD Vance’s visit to Milan as head of the American delegation that attended the opening ceremony on Friday.
He and his family visited Leonardo da Vinci’s “The Last Supper” closer to the city center, far from the protest, which also was against the deployment of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to provide security to the US delegation.
US Homeland Security Investigations, an ICE unit that focuses on cross-border crimes, frequently sends its officers to overseas events like the Olympics to assist with security. The ICE arm at the forefront of the immigration crackdown in the US is known as Enforcement and Removal Operations, and there is no indication its officers are being sent to Italy.
At the larger, peaceful demonstration, which police said numbered 10,000, people carried cardboard cutouts to represent trees felled to build the new bobsled run in Cortina. A group of dancers performed to beating drums. Music blasted from a truck leading the march, one a profanity-laced anti-ICE anthem.
“Let’s take back the cities and free the mountains,” read a banner by a group calling itself the Unsustainable Olympic Committee. Another group called the Association of Proletariat Excursionists organized the cutout trees.
“They bypassed the laws that usually are needed for major infrastructure project, citing urgency for the Games,” said protester Guido Maffioli, who expressed concern that the private entity organizing the Games would eventually pass on debt to Italian taxpayers.
Homemade signs read “Get out of the Games: Genocide States, Fascist Police and Polluting Sponsors,” the final one a reference to fossil fuel companies that are sponsors of the Games. One woman carried an artificial tree on her back decorated with the sign: “Infernal Olympics.”
The demonstration followed another last week when hundreds protested the deployment of ICE agents.
Like last week, demonstrators Saturday said they were opposed to ICE agents’ presence, despite official statements that a small number of agents from an investigative arm would be present in US diplomatic territory, and not operational on the streets.
