Benjamin Netanyahu seeks pardon from Israeli president

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has asked the country’s President Isaac Herzog to pardon him in a corruption case he has been fighting.

The president’s office said Herzog would hear from judicial officials before considering a “highly consequential” request.

Netanyahu has been on trial for the past five years on charges of bribery, fraud and breach of trust in connection with three separate cases. He denies wrongdoing.

He said in a video message that he wanted to see the process through to the end, but the national interest “demanded not to do so.”

Israel’s opposition said he should plead guilty before seeking a pardon.

Earlier this month, U.S. President Donald Trump urged Herzog to grant a “full pardon” to Netanyahu.

At the time, Herzog made clear that anyone seeking a pardon would have to submit a formal request.

On Sunday, his office released the request and a letter from Netanyahu himself, given “the significance and implications of this extraordinary request.”

It did not indicate when the president might make a decision.

In 2020, Benjamin Netanyahu became the first sitting Israeli prime minister to stand trial:

• In the first case, prosecutors accused him of accepting gifts, mainly cigars and champagne, from powerful businessmen in exchange for favors

• He is accused in a second case of offering to help improve the circulation of Israeli newspapers in exchange for positive coverage

• Third, prosecutors accuse him of pushing for regulatory decisions that benefited the controlling shareholder of an Israeli telecommunications company in exchange for positive coverage by a news website.

Netanyahu has pleaded not guilty to all charges and has called the trial a “witch hunt” by political opponents.

In a defiant video message on Sunday, he claimed that the case against him was collapsing but that the process was tearing Israel apart from within.

The Prime Minister added: “I am convinced, like many others across the country, that an immediate end to the trial will go a long way to calming the flames and promoting the broad reconciliation – something our country desperately needs.”

Netanyahu said he was required to testify three times a week, calling it “an impossible request.”

He insisted that a pardon would help Israel fend off threats and seize opportunities by promoting “national unity.”

His political opponents accuse Netanyahu of trying to conflate his interests with those of the country.

Opposition leader Yair Lapid said a pardon would be impossible if Netanyahu did not admit guilt, express remorse and immediately withdraw from political life.

Yair Golan, a left-wing politician and former deputy commander of the Israeli army, said that “only the guilty” would seek pardon.

According to Israel’s Basic Law, the president “has the power to pardon criminals and reduce or modify their sentences.”

However, Israel’s High Court has previously ruled that the president can pardon individuals before they are convicted if it is in the public interest or there are extreme personal circumstances.

Netanyahu’s right-wing Likud party and its supporters have supported a pardon for its leader.

But for many Israelis, especially on the left, it will be seen as yet another departure from the country’s image as a strong democracy with a strong legal system.

Public concerns over the government’s judicial reform plans led hundreds of thousands of people to take to the streets in protest for months until Hamas-led attacks on October 7, 2023, triggered the latest war in Gaza.

In a separate case, The International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Netanyahu last year. Former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant is suspected of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity during the war between Israel and Hamas.

Netanyahu condemned the move as “anti-Semitism.”