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Former police official: Indictment against PM likely
Ahiya Raved
Published: 12.05.08, 13:31
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14 Talkbacks for this article
1. Excellent news !!
augustine e johnson ,   Birmingham-usa   (05.12.08)
great news -- he is giving up too much land to the islamist -- time for a total change in israel ======== augustine e johnson-usa
2. The cat has nine lives.
Miriam ,   Israel   (05.12.08)
Wait and see he'll be clean of all charges. Leave it up to the Leftist Court . As long as he's not religious and he's part of their Leftist click, and HE'S READY TO GIVE AWAY JERUSALEM AND MOST OF ISRAEL, they'll make sure he finishes his term until the end even with ALL his corruptions. After that, they "might" indict him.
3. Olmert said he would resign if he were indicted!!
Chaya ,   Bat Yam, Israel   (05.12.08)
4. thank god is out of office soon!
ariela ,   haifa   (05.12.08)
we demand new elections now! let the people of israel decide who their leader should be!
5. Al Capone
Elliot Ness ,   Chicago, Illinois   (05.12.08)
The feds tried for years to get Al Capone on racketering and bootlegging without success. They finally put him away for tax evasion. Question.. did Mr. Olmert pay tax and value added tax on the income he received?...
6. Right on nr 9 miriam
DAVID ,   JUDEA   (05.12.08)
As long as one belongs to the "Shalom cult" the courts will white wash him , in order for them to continui to bow down to more meaningless peace agreements and to further their new world order secular agenda.
7. and more...
Yisraeli   (05.12.08)
Wilson et al v. ImageSat International N.V. et al Plaintiffs: Stephen M. Wilson, BRW Engineering Ltd., Wis Partners Ltd., Moshe Bar-Lev, Patrick Rosenbaum, Michael Morris, Haim Yifrah, Top Down Partners, LLC, Joel Levine, Morris Talansky, Abraham Moshel, Magma International Services, Ltd., Albert Reichmann, Hexagram & Co. and Polybutes Company Defendants: ImageSat International N.V., Israel Aircraft Industries, Ltd., Elbit Systems Ltd., Moshe Keret, Izhak Nissan, Jacob Weiss, Menashe Broder, Shimon Eckhaus, Michael Federman, Estate of Jacob Toren, Joseph Ackerman, Joseph Gasper, Gino Piperno-Beer, James DePalma, David Arzi, Yoav Chelouche and Yehoshua Eldar Morris Talansky is a founding partner, and a major shareholder, of ImageSat , an Israeli company that rents out access to spy satellites and their high-resolution images -- often to governments, for purposes of military intelligence. ImageSat is enjoined by an agreement with the Israeli Defense Ministry from selling access or data to Arab states at war with Israel, or to the "rogue states" of Iran, Cuba, and North Korea. However, Talansky and his group of fellow shareholders are anxious for a quick return on their investment, and are less than happy with these pesky restrictions. They have attempted to skirt the ban on sales to Iran by negotiating a deal with notorious Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez, a close ally of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad. Chavez is a radical Marxist and anti-American, and like Ahmedinejad, has called for the destruction of Israel. Talansky's associate and fellow ImageSat shareholder Stephen Wilson began negotiating a large-scale deal with Chavez in 1999, and even moved to Venezuela in 2001. By 2002, he secured Chavez's interest in a multi-million dollar deal with ImageSat for spy satellite access. But to the chagrin of Wilson, Talansky, and their fellow investors, ImageSat -- together with its parent companies, Israel Aircraft Industries and Elbit Systems -- balked at the deal for obvious security reasons. Enraged, Talansky and friends filed suit against ImageSat, in a bid to force them to provide Chavez with the spy data. In the lawsuit, the investors also charge ImageSat with blocking similar lucrative deals they tried to make with Angola and Russia, also countries closely allied with Israel's enemies. So while Talansky was fighting to circumvent Israel's security restrictions on ImageSat, he was also giving hundreds of thousands of dollars to Israel's Minister of Industry and Trade, Ehud Olmert. It will be interesting to see whether the ImageSat conflict plays any role in the current investigation and expected indictment.
8. why stop there
Yisraeli   (05.12.08)
The Laundry Man Morris Talansky, of course, is the suddenly famous American Jewish businessman who funneled hundreds of thousands of dollars to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, currently under police investigation. The payments were made during Olmert's tenures as Jerusalem Mayor, and later as Minister of Industry and Trade, and were disguised as contributions made to the "New Jerusalem Foundation", a supposedly charitable organization under Olmert's direct control. Talansky operated as the NJF's main U.S. contact and treasurer. Who, exactly, is Morris Talansky, and whose interests does he represent? Well, among other things, Talansky is an ordained rabbi, with semicha from YU, and he served once in a pulpit position in Portland, Oregon. He later went into business, and became embroiled in many conflicts and lawsuits with his various associates. These conficts are marked by allegations of violent threats and extortion, and a review of the court records paints the picture of a shady loan shark that seems to be a character right out of an episode of The Sopranos. From the New York Times: At least two of the lawsuits involving Mr. Talansky contain allegations that he or people he enlisted made threats in the course of collecting debts or resolving business conflicts. He sued one of his accusers, Richard Penzer, for libel in 1995 in state court on the grounds that the accusations had jeopardized Mr. Talansky's longtime job raising money for Shaare Zedek Hospital in Jerusalem. The case was settled three years later, when Mr. Talansky accepted $60,000 and a one-line apology from Mr. Penzer. Initially at odds with Mr. Talansky over a real estate deal, Mr. Penzer had sent donors and officials associated with Shaare Zedek letters in 1994 asserting that Mr. Talansky had threatened him "with the expressed goal of extorting money". Court records include a sworn statement from a police file, dated January 1992, in which a Long Island man said he had met Mr. Talansky one night at Scores, a topless bar in Manhattan, and tried to help him collect a debt from Mr. Penzer. "He began to tell me about how he took a devastating loss of approximately $2.8 million in a real estate deal that went bad," the Long Island man, Michael Sciotto, told the police. "He was swindled and he described it as a setup." The statement continued, "I told him I would talk to Mr. Penzer and see if I could shake him up a little and possibly could get Talansky¢s money back." In another lawsuit, Mr. Talansky sued a man who he said promised him "substantial interest at low or no risk" on a $300,000 loan he made in 1998 to the Forgotten Woman, a retail chain that went bankrupt three months after his loan. After much litigation, the defendant, Frederick Schulman, prevailed in court on the fraud counts but also made a counterclaim accusing Mr. Talansky of sending "thugs" to collect money from him. Mr. Talansky replied that he had sold the right to collect part of the debt to a third party and could not be held responsible. The judge rejected Mr. Schulman's request for summary judgment on the extortion charge, but said he could pursue it in a trial. The parties eventually settled, according to a lawyer in the case. Using the phony "New Jerusalem Fund" as a front, Talansky has been funneling money to Olmert for nine years. But Olmert isn't the only policitian Talansky has helped out: Over the last two decades, he has made generous financial contributions to the campaigns of Mayor Rudy Guilianni (Republican, 2000), President George W. Bush (Republican, 2003), Senator Edward M. Kennedy (Democrat, 1992), House Speaker Thomas S. Foley (Democrat, 1994) President Bill Clinton (Democrat, 1995). An equal-opportunity contributor, indeed. In her written logs of Olmert's payments from Talansky, Shula Zaken, Olmert's personal secretary (recently placed under house arrest), Talansky is referred to as "The Laundry Man".
9. uri Messer
Yisraeli   (05.12.08)
Uri Messer handled Morris Talansky donations for Olmert Olmert’s long-time friend and fellow attorney Uri Messer reportedly cooperates with the police investigation against the prime minister regarding the American donations. The money in question were not Moshe Talansky’s but collected by him. It is unknown what part of the money Morris Talansky has pocketed. Thus, Talansky received $90,000 kickbacks as a salary in 2004 for collecting donations for Shaarei Tzedek Hospital. He is not donating his own money for the last decade. Morris Talansky allegedly passed the money either directly to Olmert or to his secretary Shula Zaken. The funds were to be used for Olmert’s mayoral and the Knesset elections. Both Olmert and Shula Zaken passed the funds to Uri Messer to be spent for campaign purposes. Uri Messer is married to Deputy Attorney General Davida Lachman-Messer, hilariously in charge of tax and corporate matters, the very field of Uri Messer’s purportedly illegal activities as an attorney. That makes is easier for Attorney General Mazuz to press Uri Messer to testify against Olmert. We received a yet unconfirmed report of Uri Messer suffering an odd traffic incident. A sensible insurer won’t make a policy on his life now. Also check out: No. 2 for Israeli PM's party in U.S. a convicted criminal Kadima rep with history of forgery, grand larceny speaking in synagogues, debates http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=51076
10. to Ness #5
Al Capone ,   Chicago, IL   (05.12.08)
I am doing well. I am waiting for a call Prince Olmert (as my friend Morris calles him). Please call me if need some help from my boys.
11. #7 - 9 - Yisraeli - from your long drawn out posts....
Andy ,   ramat hasharon   (05.12.08)
it looks like you have too much time on your hands. Give us a break...
12. Banana Republic Comments
guy ,   los angeles   (05.12.08)
It's fine that so many people want Olmert to resign, but as far as comments by the Police, past and present, they are way out of line. They can be accused of being biased and prejudicing the investigation----and as to the comments of this Police official, he should know better than to speculate
13. #3: olmert of course is a man of his word(??!?)
DAVID ,   new york   (05.12.08)
he said that not because he is a wonderful guy. he said that in order to have people stop talking about this until the indictment. that can take a half a year and he hopes things will blow over by then (as it did with the winograd commission). he aint no idiot. (this is not my opinion, it was in a wall street journal article)
14. Police acted with"Courage" ??
Nora ,   Tel Aviv   (05.12.08)
Former officer Borovsky, can you explain to us why exactly police needs "Courage" to investigate this case? We know that the Sicilian police needed courage to investigate the money launderings of the Cosa Nostra`s Padrino . But this is not the case with Olmert. So, why in earth police needs courage?
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