Netanyahu defense asks court to summon former A-G Avichai Mandelblit to testify before election

His testimony is likely to focus on what he authorized investigators to examine, when he authorized it and whether police went beyond those limits.

Former attorney-general Avichai Mandelblit, who authorized the investigations of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and later decided to indict him, could take the witness stand in Netanyahu’s criminal trial weeks before the election. Netanyahu’s defense asked the Jerusalem District Court on Thursday to summon him.

The defense requested seven days of testimony, beginning October 11 and continuing on October 12 and October 18-22. The first proposed date falls four days after the third anniversary of October 7 and just over two weeks before the October 27 election.

It would be Mandelblit’s first appearance as a witness in the trial. Israeli law requires the attorney-general’s consent to open a criminal investigation against a sitting prime minister. Mandelblit gave that consent and, in 2019, decided to charge Netanyahu in Cases 1000, 2000 and 4000.

His testimony is likely to focus on what he authorized investigators to examine, when he authorized it and whether police went beyond those limits. The defense has argued that some investigative steps lacked the required approval and has challenged evidence obtained through them.

Prosecutors say Mandelblit approved the investigations and dispute the defense’s account of what his consent covered.

Wiretap on Netanyahu associate stopped due to lack of proper approval

That disagreement has surfaced again in recent testimony. Former investigator Shmuel Sharvit said a court-authorized wiretap on Netanyahu associate Natan Eshel was stopped after less than a month because it had not received the necessary approval from Mandelblit. A former police legal adviser, Alon Tsarfati, testified that the attorney-general’s consent was required to open an investigation, but not for every step taken within one.

At a hearing this week, Eran Kamin, a former senior Lahav 433 officer, said he had met journalist Ben Caspit at a café to check the reliability of information about gifts to the Netanyahu family; the defense questioned him about an alleged transcript discussing private investigators and airport cameras, whose accuracy Kamin disputed.

The prosecution has pointed to Mandelblit’s approval of inquiries into gifts to Netanyahu. The defense has questioned whether that approval extended to particular lines of inquiry. Mandelblit could now be asked to address the competing accounts directly.

Mandelblit announced his decision to indict Netanyahu in November 2019, and the indictment was filed in January 2020. The trial began that May. Netanyahu took the witness stand in December 2024 and finished testifying in June this year.

The defense has since called other witnesses, including former investigators.