During the morning news program last Friday on Kan Reshet Bet, MK Amit Halevi (Likud) was interviewed about what has come to be known as Qatargate.
The Qatar affair involves Qatar’s alleged employment of at least two members of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s inner circle in an advisory/public relations capacity, over which the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) opened an investigation at the beginning of last week on suspicions of serious irregularities and possible criminal transgressions.
Halevi stated that the only reason an investigation has been opened is because the prime minister is Benjamin Netanyahu, whom Ronen Bar, Shin Bet head until April 10, is determined (according to the Likud) to oust from power without elections. He added that if Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid were prime minister, or anyone else besides Netanyahu, no investigation would have been opened.
It should be noted that Netanyahu maintains there is nothing to investigate and that the two who have been detained and investigated – Yonatan Urich and Eli Feldstein – were being held under degrading conditions as hostages, terms that are used in connection with those taken hostage by Hamas on October 7.
I believe it is accurate to say there is more we don’t know than we do know about this rather bizarre affair, but both what Halevi said and what Netanyahu has claimed seem to be far removed from the reality.
Though until the Qatar affair broke out, Urich and Feldstein were both part of Netanyahu’s close entourage – Urich as Netanyahu’s main strategic advisor and part of the Likud’s new media network established towards the 2015 elections (which is referred to by the opposition as part of the Likud’s “poison machine”), and Feldstein as Netanyahu’s spokesperson for military affairs – neither has been on the payroll of the Prime Minister’s Office.
Feldstein was not on the payroll because he did not receive the required security clearance (the reason was never publicly revealed), and some form of payment was arranged for him through a Jewish lobbyist for Qatar in the US – Jay Footlik.
In the past, Urich was on the Likud payroll – especially during successive election campaigns – but he has always had some private clients as well and was engaged in recent years in public relations activities on behalf of Qatar. For example, before the 2022 World Cup soccer tournament held in Qatar, Urich collaborated with another former Netanyahu aide, Israel (Srulik) Einhorn, within the framework of the latter’s media agency, Perception.
Although no claims have been made to date that Urich or Feldstein caused any security damage to Israel, the irregular nature of their employment and activities – especially their apparently completely unregulated contacts with Qatar – raises further concern.
Israel-Qatar relations
Though Qatar is not considered an enemy state, Israel’s relations with it are complicated and ambivalent. On the one hand, Qatar is known to support the Muslim Brotherhood and various Muslim terrorist organizations, including Hamas. On the other hand, it has played a constructive role over the last year and a half in trying to attain a hostage deal between Hamas and Israel.
Qatar is also known to invest vast sums of money in American universities and played a major financial role in the anti-Israel/antisemitic demonstrations at many American universities last year over the Israel-Hamas War.
But going back to what Halevi said in his interview last Friday, the reason why none of Lapid’s aides, nor those of previous prime ministers, were ever investigated on similar charges is not because the Shin Bet treats Netanyahu differently. It is because never before has there been any reason to suspect that such aides were in contact with states whose relations with Israel are as complicated as those between Qatar and Israel for financial remuneration or some other perks.
It should also be noted that the sort of twisted reality that appears to have existed in Netanyahu’s office with regard to Urich and Feldstein develops over time (assuming, of course, that we are talking of a democracy). Netanyahu has been in power now for 17 years overall.
Irregularities appear in Netanyahu's conduct
Already in his first term, 1996-99, certain irregularities started to appear in his formal conduct, connected at first to financial matters – for example, the Amedi affair, in which Netanyahu and his wife tried to make the state pay for various services they had received from the contractor Avner Amedi in their private capacities. Transgressions of the sort suspected to have occurred in Qatargate appeared only in Netanyahu’s sixth premiership, which began on December 29, 2022.
It should be noted that Lapid’s premiership lasted for only six months, and even if it had lasted longer, it is unlikely that it would have deteriorated to the levels of moral depravity and loss of normative values that the current government has done.
How history will judge the current government and its drifting away from the values and norms of a relatively well-functioning liberal democracy in the direction of an increasingly chaotic illiberal democracy, future generations will find out.
I do not think one can fully blame the right/religious nature of the government for the current situation. I believe that the fact that we have a prime minister whose personal political survivability is more important than what exactly is being done and how has led us to where we are today with regard to Qatargate and to other regrettable events.
Incidentally, it is not clear whether Netanyahu was aware in real time of his aides’ sideshow with Qatar. His quick response last Tuesday with regard to the investigations involving Urich and Feldstein – just before leaving for an official visit to Hungary, followed by a brief visit in Washington – appeared to be driven more by concern that one or both might turn state’s witness against him than by the case itself.
In his evidence, Netanyahu denied any knowledge of contacts between the two and Qatar.Today Netanyahu will be meeting with President Donald Trump in Washington about the unexpected 17% customs duties imposed on Israeli exports to the US within the framework of the latter’s universal trade war. Let us wish him good luck in his endeavor to reverse the decree.
Over the years the writer has written both journalistic and academic articles and several books on a large variety of subjects, including international relations, Zionism, Israeli politics, and parliamentarism. In the years 1994-2010, she worked in the Knesset library and the Knesset Research and Information Center.
