Netanyahu Trial Hearing Focuses on Claims Police Searched Without Legal Basis

A heated cross-examination of retired Superintendent Eli Levi, a former lead investigator in Lahav 433, resumed on Sunday at the District Court and centered on the defense claim that the Netanyahu cases began as an illegal fishing expedition. Defense lawyer Amit Hadad pressed Levi over the early stages of the investigations, arguing that search warrants issued in June 2017 were too broad and did not specify any concrete suspicion. He told the court, “There is not a shred of evidence here,” and said the prosecution had given no additional material when asked for it.

Levi, who was asked to be addressed informally as “Amit,” struggled at times to recall the exact sequence of events. Hadad questioned why investigators examined documents from 2014, before the Bezeq-Yes deal, and whether that step had been laid out in the investigation briefing. Levi replied that, as an investigator, he had to examine “the whole timeline,” but admitted, “I do not remember” when pressed on whether it was formally authorized.

The most charged exchange came over a meeting Levi had with intelligence investigators Sarah Davidi and Otniel Afek. According to earlier testimony by Aryeh Z., Levi had seen materials they brought that indicated “bribery suspicions,” but Levi rejected that account. He said he never used the word “curiosity” and insisted, “I did not say bribery suspicions at that time. I said not to shred it, this is material.” As the argument escalated, Hadad accused him of trying to “repair” his testimony, prompting prosecutor Miri Tirosh to jump up and shout, “That is improper!”

The hearing exposed the defense’s broader strategy in Case 4000, to argue that the investigation was “tainted.” The claim is that police created a case from scratch by opening one matter in order to eavesdrop and search for material on other cases, without proper expansion warrants. If the court accepts that investigators operated in legal fog and without valid authority, the defense says the evidence derived from those searches could be thrown out.