Comptroller to hold 'Bibi-tours' affair hearing next week
New information prompts hearing on allegations that Prime Minister Netanyahu took trips abroad that were improperly founded; attorney general announced in 2014 that there would be no criminal investigation.
State Comptroller Yosef Shapira is set to hold a hearing next week for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu regarding the so-called "Bibi-Tours" affair – long-standing allegations of improper funding for travel expenses.
The decision to hold a hearing was based on new information that reached the comptroller in recent months. The hearing is to precede the completion of the comptroller's report on the matter, which Shapira is supposed to finish by February 15, and which will be published as part of the annual reports planned for publication in late April.
Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein announced in September 2014 that there would be no criminal probe into the affair, adopting the police's position that there was no evidence supporting an investigation of the prime minister.
The controversy erupted in the wake of a Channel 10 report saying there was evidence that in two separate 2006 incidents, while Netanyahu was opposition chief, different groups funded two of his trips abroad.
Weinstein said at the time that police advised ending the investigation because of a lack of evidence.
Three years passed between the Channel 10 report and Weinstein's decision to close the investigation, which the attorney general said was because considering the evidence was complex and time-consuming.
The investigative report said that Netanyahu traveled abroad at the expense of various businessmen during the time he served as MK and finance minister between his two terms as prime minister.
According to the report, in some cases Netanyahu was guilty of double-billing a number of organizations and Jewish donors who were interested in closer ties when he flew abroad.
The report claimed that Netanyahu did not receive approval from the ethics committee for all of his flights. Lawyer David Shomron, who represented Netanyahu, said that one of the flights in question -- Netanyahu's August 2006 flight to London -- was funded by the Knesset, while his wife Sara's was funded by a Jewish group.
He claimed the "mistake" arose because Sara was registered under her husband's name, thus giving the impression that Netanyahu himself was reimbursed twice for the same flight.
Regarding a flight to New York in September 2006, Shomron said suspicion was also based on a mistake. He claimed the Jewish group filed two invoices for two different flights, but each invoice noted another name of the organization, thus again mistakenly indicating double-billing.
