Nochi Dankner, the former controlling shareholder of IDB Group and once one of Israel’s most powerful businessmen, withdrew his opposition to the banks’ request to open insolvency proceedings against him and declare him bankrupt. The hearing took place before Judge Nurit Tabib Mizrahi at the Tel Aviv Magistrate’s Court, and the court is now expected to grant the banks’ petition and issue an order opening proceedings. Despite that, the sides indicated they still want to keep negotiating a revised debt settlement.
Lawyers for Dankner and the creditor banks, Leumi, Hapoalim, Mizrahi Tefahot and Discount, asked for an additional 30 days to continue talks even after the insolvency order and the appointment of a trustee to Dankner’s assets. Dankner told the court, “I am giving up,” saying he had already given everything he had and was still willing to give more. He said he had effectively been insolvent for more than a decade, had tried to avoid bankruptcy, sold his home, used grants and gifts from family and friends, and created the company Hushen Foodtech in the hope it would generate money for a settlement, but “that did not work out.” He added that Hushen Foodtech is “on the way to collapse.”
Attorney Shalom Goldblatt noted that Dankner is 71 and said future earning capacity was no longer relevant. He explained that Dankner was no longer opposing the banks, despite taking the opposite position in court last month, and added, “We bow our heads and say that if that is what the banks want, that is what will be.”
Dankner’s original debt to the banks is estimated at about NIS 510 million, mostly from personal guarantees tied to companies through which he controlled IDB. Under a 2016 settlement, he undertook to repay NIS 180 million and the rest from future income, but so far he has repaid about NIS 110 million. The banks had already granted four postponements before filing in April to have him declared bankrupt, after he failed to comply with the latest arrangement from December 2025 and did not make an additional NIS 5 million payment.
A central asset in the dispute is “Beit Hashenahav” in Jerusalem, part of the estate of his late father, businessman Yitzhak Dankner. The office and retail tower on Beit Hahadfus Street in Givat Shaul, which houses, among others, traffic and family courts and the Planning Administration, was pledged under the settlement. The banks value the relevant rights at NIS 90 million to NIS 150 million. Dankner rejected claims that he delayed selling it for years, saying he had been working to sell it since his father’s death in 2023 despite major economic turmoil and the war. He said he would immediately go from court to meet a potential buyer and wants to help sell assets and reach discharge as fast as possible, even if it takes two or three years.
