Two earlier elections, in April and September, ended inconclusively, with neither Mr. Netanyahu, nor his chief opponent, Benny Gantz, of the centrist Blue and White party, able to muster the majority needed to form a viable government.
Mr. Netanyahu is accused of trading official favors worth hundreds of millions of dollars to Israeli media moguls for illicit gifts of cigars, champagne and jewelry, as well as positive news coverage.
Clinging to the premiership — from which analysts say he is better positioned to fight his legal battle — Mr. Netanyahu has long argued that the criminal investigations against him are the result of a witch hunt led by leftist, elitist forces trying to oust him through “fake news” in the liberal media and through the courts.
But Mr. Netanyahu has zigzagged on the question of immunity, aware of its unpopularity and the pitfalls of appearing to evade justice. He dismissed the idea before the April election, avoiding handing the opposition damaging campaign fodder. But this week, as the deadline for his request approached, he declared that immunity was a “foundation stone of democracy.”
Many countries, including Israel, have immunity laws to protect lawmakers’ freedom of action and speech in the course of their parliamentary duties.
In Israel, a lawmaker can also seek immunity, under certain circumstances, for alleged crimes not committed in the line of parliamentary duty, for as long as the accused is a member of Parliament. The circumstances listed in the law include an indictment that is not drafted in good faith or is discriminatory, to protect lawmakers from politically motivated prosecution.
Miki Zohar, Likud’s chief whip, said this week that Mr. Netanyahu was the victim of persecution on ideological grounds, and Mr. Netanyahu appears to have been laying the groundwork for such an argument with his assertions of a witch hunt.
Source : Nytimes
