June 2020 Activity Summary Report

We petitioned the High Court of Justice in demand to fully investigate the Submarines Affair

This is not a regular petition but a unique one, in which we will expose in front of the Court new evidential material obtained throughout years of intensive toil of our debriefing department (the work still continues in order to get more materials relevant to the Affair). Now that these materials will reach the judges, the investigation must find answers to the many questions yet left concerning the Affair: Why it had been approved to purchase submarines that are not needed by the Navy and weighs heavily on the defense budget? Why, against the stance of IDF and the Defense Establishment, selling advanced submarines to Egypt had been approved? Regarding this issue, was the State’s security a factor taken into account, or just the profits of some private persons? Why the Minister of Defense and IDF had not been updated with significant information relating to selling the submarines to Egypt? Did the shares of the company that produced steel for the submarines’ company generated financial interests for Binyamin Netanyahu due to which he enhanced these crazy deals? Did Netanyahu mislead the Attorney General’s office? Though he admitted a great part of the facts, why wasn’t Netanyahu interrogated? How come he is submitting conflicting versions yet is not being questioned? All of these questions must get answers! Our petition demands to order full criminal investigation of the whole Submarines Affair including interrogating Netanyahu and an investigation of his Steel Company Shares Affair. In addition, in this same petition we demand to establish a State Commission of Inquiry to investigate all of the affairs. A dramatic and significant achievement followed the petition’s submission: while up to this day the High Court of Justice has rejected no less than 6 petitions concerning the issue, the judges now have consented to discuss this severe affair. They also demanded from the State to provide answers for the questions raised in our petition. The High Court of Justice’s judges also understand that the new evidential materials we submitted have changed the scene so that the State must provide answers. Furthermore, following our applying to KM Ofer Shelakh who is chairman of the Knesset’s State Control Committee, the committee discussed the Submarines Affair. Parallel to the petition we have started a vast public struggle – street demonstrations and a petition already signed by thousands – with no intention of giving up unless this grave affair is investigated fully and thoroughly.

Huge win for a whistleblower accompanied by the Movement: Immediate return to work by order of the State Comptroller

While typing data concerning tenders as he was asked by his boss, a city corporation’s worker suspected that this boss had already opened the bids’ envelops before implementing any qualitative evaluating of the tender’s participates and obviously against the rules. Was it logical that the boss dictated the participants’ scores according to recommendations given via phone calls – though no phone calls had ever been made? The employee refused to partake in the fraud and reported to the company’s internal auditor. Instead of being praised for his morality, he was transferred to a minor position in another office while subjected to restrictions and harassments initiated by his superiors. Following, he realized that they were planning to summon him for a hearing before dismissal. He contacted our department for the support of whistleblowers that immediately started handling the case. Following the employee’s dismissal we submitted to the State Comptroller an urgent request for immediate interfering. Further on we succeeded in acquiring a protection order that enabled the employee to retain his job throughout the State Comptroller’s investigation.

We were delighted to inform him of his returning to his job promptly while maintaining the status he had before the dismissal.

NO to harming democracy under the pretext of the significant fight against Corona virus

Obviously the fight against Corona is crucial; however it seems that the Government attempts to take advantage of the situation in order to pass several issues which are unnecessary but will be harmful to democracy and to the Public. This is the reason for our disapproval of the law in its current formation and so we demand that each restriction about to be imposed on the public must get the Knesset’s confirmation or that of a Knesset Committee. We demand full transparency and detailed publication of the reasons given to each and every intended restriction. We also demand not to harm the freedom of demonstrating (and other demands). We submitted to the Knesset Members a position paper in which our reservations are thoroughly explained.

We asked the President to maintain the appreciation granted to whistleblowers

After petitioning twice to the High Court of Justice and ensuring the publication of a declaration for recommending whistleblowers who are worthy of the President’s Awards, we have been following the way in which the recommendations are being treated. We know that during the last two years, at least 14 civil servants who acted for proper administration and against corruption have been recommended by the Public for the awards. The one thing left to be accomplished is performing the ceremony of granting the awards and respect to the persons who paid heavily for protecting the Public’s interest.

Exposed by us: 19 local authorities have been acting without internal auditors for over a year now

The Internal Auditors Project is our enterprise of following the appointments of internal auditors in local authorities. Appointing an internal auditor is critical in order to prevent corruption; it is also a legal obligation that was breached by 19 local authorities across the country. Following our project, several local authorities have at last improved their conduct and implemented relevant tenders: Beit She’an, regional council Mevo’ot Khermon and others.

Following our interference: The State Comptroller will investigate the breaching of a protection order granted to a whistleblower

After uncovering severe faults in the conduct of senior employees of a certain local council he worked for, a brave internal auditor was acknowledged as a whistleblower by the former State Comptroller. The protection order granted to this auditor due to his action should have protected him from being dismissed but, in contrast, he started receiving threatening letters “advising” him to quit his job out of his free will and “end nicely” instead of getting fired. When the protected whistleblower argued before the new State Comptroller Matanyahu Englman that his protection order was not enforced, he was answered that he had to submit a new complaint. The idea of a protection order turning worthless is unthinkable! It is impossible that the granted protection is not being enforced. After an intensive legal debriefing we submitted to the State Comptroller a comprehensive position paper comprising the demand to see to it that any protection order given by the Comptroller will be respected. Our legal stance had been received: the Comptroller will examine the case as one of breaching a protection order – just the way it should be – without returning to the starting point.

More from the Movement Desk for this month

We contacted Minister of Transportation Miri Regev concerning the appointment of the Airports Authority Chairman. The person appointed to this function is a former Likud Knesset Member who is considered a close associate of Likud‘s seniors including Israel Katz and Regev herself while allegedly he has no experience in what is relevant to the transportation and aviation disciplines. Hence is the suspicion that this might be a political appointment * Do ministers, executives, and Knesset Members need security strobe lights for their cars? We petitioned our demand to order the Ministry of Transportation to submit to us an updated list of the persons who were granted the permit of “security vehicle” for years, their functions and the criteria according to which they received this permit *An internal audit report of NTA – Metropolitan Mass Transit System, the company in charge of constructing a mass transit system for the Tel Aviv metropolis (“The Light Train”) – allegedly expose failures and negligence concerning all managing levels of this venture. This is the reason for urgent letters we sent to the Ministers of Transportation and Finance, in which we demanded from them to be committed to implementing the audit report and to watch carefully the procedures of proper administration, or else we will have to act legally in order to ensure the end of this waste of money * Following the publication of businessman Tedy Sagi’s “VIP Route” exemption from Corona quarantine, we demanded from the Ministry of Health to release information concerning possible other people who received such exemptions and if so, to explain what were the legal justifications for these decisions * The media released the news of Mosheh Gerin, chairman of Tzomet party, appointed by the PM to a newly invented – and senior – role as the PM’s advisor for agriculture and settlement. This appointment materialized due to Gerin’s consent to refrain from running independently for 2020 Knesset elections and support the Likud instead. In letters to the Attorney General and to the Acting Police Inspector General we demanded to open an immediate inquiry of Gerin’s legality and eligibility regarding his appointment and the probability of criminal offenses. Could this be Election Bribery?? * Following our petition, the Attorney General determined that Netanyahu will not be permitted to receive NIS 10 million for financing his legal expenses because such an act is considered receiving a forbidden gift * We petitioned against accepting Netanyahu’s request for receiving retroactive tax benefits. We also rejected unequivocally his request for costly benefits at the expense of the public budget for financing his Keisaria private house * We participated in Knesset discussions of the Norwegian Law in order to express our objection to harming the Public by implementing this law. We also submitted to the KMs a relevant detailed position paper. The Norwegian Law alters the State’s Basic Laws without any public discussion; it also weakens the Legislature compared to the Executive, weighs on the work of the Government and its offices and wastes public money while a national financial crisis is in the making – all just for honors and jobs for the Party’s members.