Moshe Gabbai a long-time close associate of Religious Affairs Minister Aharon Abu Hatzeira and a senior official of the ministry, was remanded in custody for 15 days by a Tel Aviv district court today. It was the first such court action since the investigation began several months ago of allegations that Abu, Hatzeira and other ministry officials misappropriated funds.
Gabbai was jailed at the request of the police. The Tel Aviv magistrate who ordered him held after examining evidence in his chambers, said there was sufficient prima facie material to warrant the remand. He emphasized, however, that it should not be construed as on indication of guilt.
A police attorney told the court that Gabbai is suspected of taking kickbacks from several yeshivas which received unwarranted and disproportionate increases in their allocations from the Religious Affairs Ministry. The police said he is also suspected of bribery in a recent local election. Gabbai, who was held for questioning for 48 hours before his remand, reportedly has refused to cooperate with the police. Under Israeli law, a suspect may be held in custody for a maximum of 15 days. But the court can renew the remand at 15-day intervals as long as the investigation continues.
AN UNEXPECTED TURN
The case took an unexpected turn today when Israel’s two chief rabbis stated that on religious grounds one of the chief witnesses against Gabbai could not testify. He is Deputy Mayor Yisrael Gottlieb of Bnei Brak, an Orthodox township north of Tel Aviv, who is himself a suspect in the case and had offered to turn state’s evidence.
Ashkenazic Chief Rabbi Shlomo Goren and Sephardic Chief Rabbi Ovodia Yosef, whose opinions were solicited separately, both insisted that the institution of state’s evidence was counter to Jewish religious law. According to the thief rabbis, by admitting his own guilt, the witness disqualified himself from giving acceptable evidence against any one else. They cited Biblical and Talmudical texts to that effect.
National Religious Party circles observed that Gottlieb would not be able to transgress against the chief rabbis’ injunction without losing all vestiges of his standing and his position in the party. The NRP and the entire Orthodox community in Israel has been shaken by the scandal involving the Religious Affairs Ministry.
Gottlieb himself has not commented on the chief rabbis’s stricture If he refuses to testify he faces criminal proceedings himself. It was not immediately clear to what extent the case against Gabbai hinged on Gottlieb’s testimony nor was it known to what extent the entire fabric of the case against him and Abu Hatzeira rests on Gottlieb’s evidence.
According to the police, Abu Hatzeira channeled ministry funds so his own faction of the NRP. The ministry channels funds to local religious councils, religious courts and religious schools. It has been accused of allocating funds to non-existent religious institutions.
Meanwhile, in a number of towns with many Oriental Jews, mass receptions were organized in honor of Abu-Hatzeira. Several Sephardic leaders from Europe and the U.S. arrived in Israel to meet with Premier Menachem Begin to discuss the investigation and its impact on Israel’s Sephardic population.
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