A former senior official in the Mossad spy agency was questioned under caution last week about the so-called Qatargate affair that has roiled the Prime Minister’s Office.
Rishon Lezion Magistrate’s Court Judge Menahem Mizrahi permitted publication of the development on Sunday, but issued a gag order on any other details.
Mizrahi allowed the media to report on the questioning because the former official was not placed under arrest, but prohibited releasing further information for security reasons, according to the Haaretz news outlet, which had requested permission to release the information.
The affair revolves primarily around suspicions that two Netanyahu aides — Jonatan Urich and Eli Feldstein — committed multiple offenses tied to their alleged work for a pro-Qatar lobbying firm, including contact with a foreign agent and a series of corrupt actions involving lobbyists and businessmen, all while working for the prime minister.
In May, two former senior Mossad officials were also questioned about the case on suspicion that they were working for Qatari intelligence.
Last week, Yisrael Einhorn, a former senior election campaign adviser to Netanyahu living in Serbia, was questioned by Israeli police in Belgrade over his role in the affair, as well as in a second case involving the theft of classified IDF documents and the leaking of one of them to the German daily Bild in order to sway public opinion against a deal with Hamas.
Einhorn, along with top Netanyahu aide Urich and ex-spokesman Feldstein, is also a key suspect in the intelligence leak case.
Einhorn has been living in the Serbian capital over the past year while working as an adviser to Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić, and has not returned to Israel since a probe was opened last year into the intelligence leak.
Earlier this month, IDF Maj. Gen. (res.) Yoav Mordechai, the former head of the Defense Ministry’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), was questioned on suspicion of having contact with a foreign agent and accepting a bribe as part of the Qatargate probe, Channel 13 reported.
Netanyahu has not been named as a suspect in either case.