Netanyahu Used Public Resources for Election Propaganda, Israel's Election Chief Rules

Israel's Central Elections Committee Chairman, Judge Noam Sohlberg, ruled on Sunday that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu improperly used public resources, including those of the IDF, for election campaign propaganda. Sohlberg's decision addressed six petitions filed against Netanyahu, with five being accepted in full or in part.

One petition concerned a video posted on Netanyahu's official accounts following a visit to an IDF post in southern Lebanon. Sohlberg found that while the visit's stated purpose was to boost morale and honor soldiers, the edited video omitted these aspects, focusing instead on the government's and the Prime Minister's achievements. Sohlberg described this as "election propaganda."

He further stated that the video utilized public filming and distribution resources, specifically citing documentation from the Government Press Office (GPO), and was based on a visit to an IDF post in Lebanon, a resource unavailable to other candidates. Consequently, Sohlberg determined this constituted prohibited political advertising under the Law on Election Propaganda.

In other cases, the Elections Committee chairman also found that public resources were unlawfully used for election propaganda and ordered Netanyahu to remove such materials from his social media accounts. As a result of these rulings, Netanyahu was ordered to pay 29,000 shekels in expenses to the petitioners, including the "Otzmim beYisrael" (Voters in Israel) organization.