The Jerusalem District Court has frozen 12 properties belonging to the heirs of Jacob Weinroth, the late attorney who represented Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other top Israeli figures, as part of efforts to secure repayment of an estimated NIS 440 million debt to businessmen Moshe and Mendy Gartner.
According to the court orders, the seized assets include apartments, offices, and land holdings valued at about NIS 100 million. The court also froze roughly NIS 3 million in income from the family’s diamond businesses and rental properties, which the Gartner brothers traced through financial records.
In addition, Judge David Zilber ruled last week that the Weinroth family must deposit an additional NIS 7 million in court as collateral while legal proceedings continue over the enforcement of an arbitration award issued by retired Tel Aviv District Court President Eitan Orenstein.
Dispute over investments linked to Dan Gertler
The arbitration award, submitted to the court for approval in May, largely accepted the Gartner brothers’ claims against Weinroth, who died in 2018. The brothers alleged that they had transferred tens of millions of dollars to companies under Weinroth’s control to invest in the mining businesses of Dan Gertler, another of Weinroth’s clients. Instead, they claimed, Weinroth retained the funds for himself, asserting that the money represented finder’s fees and legal fees owed to him.
“I have concluded that attorney Weinroth and his son did not initiate the business connection between the Gartner brothers and Dan Gertler and, in any case, were not entitled to any finder’s fee or other compensation from the brothers,” Orenstein wrote in the arbitration ruling. He ordered that the funds be returned with interest and indexation. The total, about $38 million, is equivalent to approximately NIS 440 million according to the Gartners’ calculations.
Heirs warn of financial collapse
Weinroth’s widow and six children have petitioned the Jerusalem District Court to annul the arbitration decision, arguing that enforcement would have catastrophic consequences for them.
“If this determination is not overturned, its practical meaning will be to destroy the economic lives of the heirs, their families, and all those dependent on them — dozens of people — who committed no wrongdoing,” they said in their filing. “Their only ‘fault’ is that they were named as heirs in the deceased’s will.” The family added that the ruling would amount to bankruptcy for seven individuals, along with their dependents.
Judge Zilber wrote in his decision that no payment had yet been made under the arbitration award. He noted that the portion of the award not in legal dispute as it concerns the estate stands at $17.5 million, or roughly NIS 200 million. That amount, he said, represents the minimum liability of the estate if the award is ultimately upheld.
Attorney Uriel Prinz, representing the Gartner brothers, argued that the heirs are the legal controllers of the estate and therefore responsible for its debts. He said the family has not explained why neither the heirs nor the estate have paid the undisputed portion of the award, nor have they disclosed the estate’s total value or whether it has been divided among them.
Judge Zilber added that “the fact that the value of the estate remains unclear, coming from those who presumably have the best information about it, yet choose to withhold details, is a factor that justifies the additional collateral beyond the real estate seizures.”
Parallel case involving Dan Gertler
In determining the NIS 7 million collateral requirement, Zilber referenced a parallel case in which the court enforced another Orenstein arbitration award ordering diamond dealer Dan Gertler to return funds to the Gartner brothers. In that case, the award totaled NIS 970 million, and the court required Gertler to post a NIS 10 million bond.
The Gartner brothers are represented by attorneys Uriel Prinz, Marina Roizer, and Ilan Golod of the S. Horowitz law firm. The Weinroth estate is represented by attorneys Eyal Rozovsky, Eli Borshtein, and Lior Reichert of Meitar law firm.
Weinroth, one of Israel’s most prominent defense attorneys, represented a long list of public figures during his career, including Netanyahu and several other senior politicians and business leaders. He died in 2018 at age 71.