Minister of Justice Tzachi Hanegbi today called on the first television channel to reveal the evidence it holds concerning revelations on the appointment of Ronni Bar-On to the position of Attorney General, due to the seriousness of the allegations.
Hanegbi said he had spoken with the people the reports allege are involved in the incident, and all of them denied the publicized details. According to Hanegbi, Bar-On told him he hadn’t seen Arie Deri in several years and the claim that Deri taped a conversation between the two is untrue.
Hanegbi said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also said the reports were utter nonsense. He revealed that during discussion of the position of Attorney General, Bar-On was not a leading candidate. He said that apparently the name of the new candidate for the position will be released on Sunday.
Yehuda Avidan, Arie Deri’s personal assistant, claimed today that the editors of Channel 1 News did not allow Deri to respond to the allegations against him, as they asked for his response just three minutes before broadcasting the item. According to him, the claim that the Shas party would oppose the Hebron agreement if Bar-On were not appointed Attorney General is untrue, as Rabbi Ovadia Yossef had announced that Shas would support the agreement.
MK Yossi Sarid said today he had submitted a request to the Acting Attorney General and Head of the National Fraud Squad to launch an investigation of the decision process in appointing Bar-On Attorney General.
Israel Radio’s legal commentator Moshe Hanegbi stated today that if it becomes clear that the details reported are true, the affair is no less significant than the fabrication of evidence in the Bus 300 incident. He called this a fatal blow to the rule of law. According to the commentator, the most serious of the details reported is the claim by Channel 1 reporter Ayala Hasoun that Ronni Bar-On’s commitment to make a plea bargain arrangement with Deri, was taped.
The commentator stated a situation could have been created in which the Attorney General became a cabinet minister’s yes-man. In addition, the tape could have been used to pressure Bar-On on other matters.