Prime Minister Levi Eshkol took the unusual step today of issuing a strong denunciation of the recent attack on members of Israel’s Judiciary by Yitzhak Raphael, National Religious Party member of the Knesset, Israel’s Parliament.
Under intensive pressure of Israel’s Supreme Court Justices and general public opinion, the Premier also made public the contents of a report of an inquiry commission headed by Justice Moshe Gaulan into bribery charges in connection with hospital construction while Mr. Raphael was Deputy Health Minister.
On the basis of the commission’s report, Mr. Raphael, who had resigned his Health Ministry post, faced criminal charges over his alleged role in the affair. He was subsequently acquitted for lack of evidence when the main prosecution witness, former Health Ministry Director General Yehuda Spiegel, who was already serving a prison term on bribery charges, refused to testify.
In public speeches, Mr. Raphael questioned the integrity of some Israeli justices, particularly Justice Gaulan, the commission head. Premier Eshkol said today that Mr. Raphael’s intimations concerning the Israel Judiciary aim to undermine the unity of Israel’s people.
In the commission report made public today, it was noted that Mr. Spiegel had been found guilty of accepting bribes for National Religious Party needs from contractors building the Tel Giborim Government hospital. The report disclosed an agreement under which 50 percent of the total bribe was transferred to the Rabbi Kook Institute which Mr. Raphael serves as chairman of the board and the other 50 percent to Bnei Yehuda Yeshiva which Mr. Spiegel serves as board chairman.
The report says that Mr. Raphael was kept informed by Mr. Spiegel on the progress of the negotiations on the bribe and that Spiegel even gave Mr. Raphael personally check for 10,000 Israel pounds. The report also charged that Mr. Raphael steered the legal work for the Tel Giborim construction project to a law firm in which Mr. Spiegel was a partner.
Mr. Raphael, meanwhile, bowed to pressures within his own National Religious Party and decided not to run for the mayoralty of Jerusalem in the municipal elections on November 2. The party had nominated him both for the mayoralty and for a top place on its slate for the Parliamentary elections.
The remaining candidates in the Jerusalem mayoralty election include the present mayor, Mordechai Ish-Shalom of Mapai; and Teddy Kollek, former director general of the Prime Minister’s Office, who heads Ben-Gurion’s Israel Workers List (Rafi).
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
