Looks like Sharon is in deep doo doo.
Scandals Jolt Sharon Campaign
With Elections Near, Israeli Leader Faces Allegations of Bribery and Fraud
By John Ward Anderson and Molly Moore
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, January 9, 2003; Page A14
JERUSALEM, Jan. 8 -- The uproar started three weeks ago with allegations of vote buying by low-level functionaries in Israel's ruling Likud Party primaries last month. Then came accusations of influence peddling and ties to individuals with criminal backgrounds. This week, following published reports of alleged bribery and coverup by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and his family, the affair snowballed into every politician's nightmare: a full-blown scandal less than three weeks before elections.
The most serious allegations came Tuesday when a leading Israeli newspaper, Haaretz, published a story based on a secret Justice Ministry document stating that Sharon and his two sons, Omri and Gilad, obtained a $1.5 million loan from a South African businessman to pay back illegal campaign contributions given to Sharon in 1999 for his race to become party leader. It is unclear whether the loan was also illegal or simply "stinks to high heaven," as a columnist wrote today, but allegations of coverup fueled the controversy.
According to the Justice Ministry document cited by Haaretz, when investigators asked Sharon how he paid back the 1999 contributions, which the state comptroller had labeled illegal, the prime minister did not mention the South African loan. In the Justice document, the newspaper reported, "The state attorneys make clear that Sharon is suspected of receiving bribes, fraud and breach of trust."
The corruption allegations form a contentious backdrop to campaigning for Israel's Jan. 28 parliamentary elections, in which Likud is expected to win the most seats. That would mean Sharon, as party leader, would remain as prime minister.
But a flurry of newspaper reports about the scandal have seriously eroded voter support for Likud, according to recent polls, transforming what was predicted as a runaway victory for Sharon into a potential battle. A survey on Haaretz's Web site tonight showed Likud's support having plummeted in the past month and that it could now expect to win 27 seats in parliament instead of the 41 projected previously. The party currently has 19 seats in the 120-member body, the Knesset.
Likud's main challenger, the Labor Party, led by Amram Mitzna, the mayor of Haifa and a former general, would win 24 seats if the election were held today, according to the Haaretz poll. Labor currently holds 26 Knesset seats.
Earlier polls showed Likud with as much as an 18-seat advantage over Labor. "There's no doubt these reports are very damaging for the Likud," said Abraham Diskin, a political scientist at Jerusalem's Hebrew University. "The voters are leaving the party."
In his first public comments about the reports tying him to corruption, Sharon said today the charges are "a despicable plot, which I will disprove with documents and facts. It has one single goal -- to bring about the downfall of the prime minister."
The South African businessman, Cyril Kern, who is described as a close friend who served with Sharon in Israel's 1948 war of independence, called the reports "character assassination." In an interview with Israel's Army Radio today, Kern said he has no business interests in Israel. Of the loan, he said, "I was very happy to help. It's what anybody would do for a friend."
In Israel, foreign campaign contributions are illegal.
A Sharon political adviser, Eyal Arad, said there is no evidence of any bribery, through the loan or otherwise, and accused the media of "an organized attempt to topple the prime minister and change the regime in Israel by means of a campaign of leaks, lies and disinformation."
The Justice Ministry announced the formation of a task force to investigate the source of the leak to the newspaper, Reuters news service reported.
Sharon's son and closest adviser, Omri, 38, has been accused in the press of making deals with people who have criminal backgrounds and who won positions on the Likud's Central Committee. Two of those men, Musa Alperon and his former partner Shlomi Oz, were imprisoned for involvement in a counterfeiting scheme in the 1980s. Both helped Omri Sharon win the No. 27 spot on the Likud slate for parliament, according to the press accounts.
A security company where Oz had been an executive and with which he reportedly maintains ties, including use of a company-paid cell phone, has been awarded contracts to provide security services to a variety of governmental institutions and facilities, including the prime minister's office, the Likud Party headquarters in Tel Aviv and the country's main airport, according to press reports.
"My son Omri had nothing to do with criminal elements who managed to get into the Central Committee," Sharon said in a television interview several weeks ago.
According to the reports, police also are investigating a contract under which Sharon's other son, Gilad, has received hundreds of thousands of dollars in consulting fees from an Israeli industrialist, David Appel, for advice on the development of a Greek vacation resort, despite the fact he has little business experience.
Many of the allegations involve vote buying by candidates who wanted a higher position on the Likud's candidate list. Under Israel's parliamentary system, voters cast ballots for a party, and then seats in parliament are awarded to parties based on the percentage of the votes they receive. The parties select members for parliament from a prioritized list published in advance of the vote. Thus, there is intense competition among candidates to be placed as high as possible on the list, to increase their chances of getting a seat.
Under the Likud's selection system, many slots were reserved for specific types of candidates. While the system was intended to provide diversity, it also created opportunities for deal-making and allowed hand-picked candidates to win with a relatively few number of votes.
One of the most controversial was the election of Inbal Gavrieli, a 27-year-old waitress with no political background. Her father, Shoni Gavrieli, hosted banquets for Likud Central Committee members at his restaurant in the coastal city of Jaffa and invited top police officials to the meals, according to Israeli press reports. The daughter placed 29th on the Likud list.
A police fraud unit and the attorney general's office are also investigating allegations that:
? Likud Central Committee members sold their votes to potential candidates for prices ranging from $200 to just over $300 each.
? Several Central Committee members were lodged at a posh hotel for a Likud Party conference, with all costs paid in cash the next morning by a little-known party activist. The activist, Michael Elnekaveh, has been arrested, but some party officials claim he was merely a middleman for higher ranking authorities trying to win influence with committee members. Sharon fired a deputy minister in the Infrastructure Ministry, Knesset member Nomi Blumenthal, for refusing to talk to police about her role in the hotel payments. She placed ninth on the Likud's candidate list. |
