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A new legal headache was created for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this week when it was revealed that Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit was examining allegations made in the fraud trial of French businessman Arnaud Mimran.
Mr Mimran, who was close to Mr Netanyahu before he was re-elected prime minister in 2009, has claimed that he gave him 170,000 euros for his political campaign.
Such a gift would have been illegal under Israel’s political finance laws and would be grounds for a criminal probe. The Prime Minister’s Office denied that Mr Netanyahu had received the sum and said that Mr Mimran had given $40,000 in 2001 to finance his “public diplomacy” work.
This is the second case concerning Mr Netanyahu’s personal finances that the attorney general has to consider. There is also an ongoing investigation into the funding for foreign trips made by the prime minister, his family members and aides while he was finance minister from 2004-2005. The allegations that trips were illegally paid for by foreign organisations and business people may, however, be subject to the statute of limitations.