Police: Charge Katsav with rape

The complete investigation file was transferred by the police to the State Prosecutor's Office, including a recommendation to put the president on trial for allegedly committing sex offenses.

Katsav is also suspected of harassing a witness and obstruction of justice, but the investigation on the issue has yet to be completed.

A statement issued by the police and the Justice Ministry at the end of a meeting between the police teams and the State Prosecutor's Office heads said that "there is alleged evidential basis that in a number of affairs, involving several women – including A. – who worked under Katsav, the president committed sex offenses, including rape, forceful indecent assault, indecent assault without consent and sexual harassment offenses.

"According to the police, there is alleged evidential basis that the president committed offenses of bribery and breach of trust as part of the different affairs. There is also alleged evidential basis that the president committed illegal weire-tapping."

It was also reported that the police have found "alleged evidence that the president committed offenses of harassing a witness and obstruction of justice, but the investigation on this issue has yet to be completed.

"As for the suspicions that A. allegedly attempted to blackmail the president for money – the investigation team has reached the conclusion that there is evidential difficulty to find sufficient evidential basis that the offense of blackmail was committed by A."

The team of attorneys overlooking the investigation since it began are now examining and evaluating the evidence presented by the police, and their recommendations will be submitted to the attorney general and the state prosecutor.

The State Prosecutor's Office is expected to review the material for the next few weeks, and the attorney general is then expected to make his final decision on the issue. Simultaneously, the president is expected to be interrogated again soon in order to complete the picture.

10 women file complaints

Major General Yohanan Danino, head of the police's investigation and intelligence department, and Brigadier General Yoav Segalovitch, head of the investigation team, arrived Sunday afternoon at Attorney General Menachem Mazuz's office in Jerusalem, where they also met with State Prosecutor Eran Shendar, and presented the investigation material to the two officials. The two also presented Mazuz with a recommendation to put the president on trial.

Upon entering the meeting, Major General Danino said that he would present the attorney general and the state prosecutor with the material, and at the end of the meeting an announcement will be made on the police's recommendation.

Ten women have filed complaints against the president, but the investigation file only refers to five of them, due to the limitation applying to the offenses Katsav is suspected of.

The police also used the evidence of the other five women in order to prove an alleged regular pattern of action exercised by the president.

Danino (R) and Segalovitch (Photo: Haim Zach)

President Katsav has been under criminal investigation since July, when a senior female aide complained she was sexually harassed while working under him. President Katsav filed a simultaneous complaint to the attorney general against the aide for extortion.

Sources close to the complainant (A.) denied Katsav's allegations stating that "she never asked him to get her a specific job."

Since then, the president has been questioned a number of times, and laid out his version of events, claiming that people are trying to frame him. Nonetheless, Katsav refrained from naming these people.

Great public pressure has been exerted to get the president to resign from office. As a result, he absented himself from the swearing in ceremony of Supreme Court President Dorit Beinisch, appealing to the Knesset House Committee to grant him 'temporary absence'.

Now Katsav has a tougher dilemma: Should he continue fulfilling a public role at a time when police claim they have evidence that he has committed sexual offenses?