The Lod District Court ruled on Thursday to extend the ban on Qatargate suspect Jonatan Urich from working in the Prime Minister’s Office or contacting others involved in the affair, overturning the Rishon Lezion Magistrate Court’s decision earlier this month.
The court also bans Urich from leaving the country for the next 60 days.
The magistrate’s court ruled on September 11 that continuing to ban Urich from working in the PMO, as requested by the police, would harm his constitutional rights, and that insufficient evidence had been presented to him regarding the threat to national security posed by Urich that would justify such injury to his rights.
Judge Amit Michles of the Lod District Court wrote in his decision, however, that Urich maintains that he has not violated any law by doing public relations work for Qatar to improve Doha’s image as a fair mediator in hostage negotiations while at the same time working as an adviser to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Since Urich claims he has done nothing wrong, the likelihood of his repeating such conduct if he returns to the PMO increases, Michles wrote, “when [such actions] could cause great harm, whether to state security or otherwise.”
Urich is facing possible charges of bribery and breach of trust in the case.
The judge also wrote that the harm to Urich’s constitutional rights is limited, since he has already been prohibited in practice from working in the PMO due to restrictions that were previously imposed, banning him from having contact with anyone involved in the affair, which includes several figures in the Prime Minister’s Office.
This is the fifth time Michles has overturned a decision by the Rishon Lezion Magistrate Court regarding Qatargate, including a ruling last month to also extend restrictions on Urich, following a police appeal of the lower court’s decision to lift them.
Rishon Lezion Magistrate’s Court Judge Menahem Mizrahi has strongly criticized the police’s repeated request for such restrictions, and asserted that there is no justification for requesting the ban on Urich working in the PMO.
Banning Urich from his place of work, Mizrahi said last month, was a “tough condition” that would harm his constitutional rights.
Urich, along with Netanyahu’s former spokesman Eli Feldstein, allegedly spearheaded a pro-Qatari public relations campaign to cast Qatar in a positive light for over a year after the October 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel, despite the Gulf state’s strong ties to the terror group.
Urich is suspected of multiple offenses in the affair, including accepting a bribe from Qatar, contact with a foreign agent and breach of trust.
During the August 19 District Court hearing, police investigator Aviv Porat said that the Qatargate investigation had led to a “substantive suspicion” that following the October 7 Hamas atrocities, Israeli officials had worked to create for Qatar “an orchestrated plan… to change the negative narrative created against it” due to Doha’s funding of Hamas.
“This plan was approved by Qatari officials and was implemented. As part of the plan, many actions were taken to change Qatar’s image, including within the State of Israel, and the respondent [Urich], together with others, allegedly took an active part in carrying out that plan, all while working in the Prime Minister’s Office,” Porat told the court.