[lbo-talk] Fun and corruption in Israeli politics: Internal Security Minister Hanegbi under investigation

[bryan]

Last week Israel Internal Security Minister Tzahi Hanegebi stated about 
the Palestinian political-prisoner hunger strikers: "The prisoners can 
strike for a day, a month, even starve to death, as far as I am concerned."

(For more on the hunger-strikers: 
http://alternativenews.org/display.php?id=4121)

This week:

http://www.maarivenglish.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=10876

Hanegbi faces criminal investigation In wake of State Comptrollers 
report. Growing demands for him to tender his resignation.
Yinon Keidari <mailto:contact at maariv.co.il?subject=Yinon%20Keidari>

Attorney General Meni Mazuz has ordered the police to begin a criminal 
investigation of their boss, Homeland Security Minister Tzahi Hanegbi.

This follows the State Comptroller’s recent report accusing Hanegbi of 
having systematically made illegal political appointments while at the 
Environment Ministry.

He is suspected of corruption, having used political appointments as 
bribes to purchase votes in the party’s central committee.

Director-General Shmuel Hershkowitz is also to be investigated, for 
having knowingly collaborated with Hanegbi and enabling him to make the 
illegal appointments.

Although other ministers have also committed similar abuses, none come 
close to the scale and volume of appointments made by Hanegbi. “Other 
ministers may have put a finger in the till, but Hanegbi seems to have 
put both his hands in the safe”, said a source in the Justice Ministry.

Another source put it even more bluntly. “Hanegbi has no sense of shame 
whatsoever. If you’re going to pee in the pool, at least have the 
decency and common sense to do it in a remote corner, not from the top 
of the diving board”.

Several MKs have demanded his resignation, saying there was no way the 
minister in charge of the police could continue to hold office while 
under a police investigation.