BICOM

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu revealed last night the number of times he spoke on the phone with Israel Hayom owner Sheldon Adelson and editor Amos Regev from 2012-2015.

Netanyahu revealed the information on Facebook and said that between 2012 and 2015 he spoke to Adelson on average 0.75 times a week, indicating there were some 117 phone calls during that period. The calls with Regev occurred around 1.5 times a week on average, totalling over 234 phone calls during the same period.

Playing down their significance, Netanyahu said: “As I have made clear, I have nothing to hide – Adelson has been a close friend of mine for about 30 years and I am happy to speak with him from time to time.”

He added: “I’ll tell you something that everybody knows: all politicians in Israel speak with publishers, editors-in-chief, and journalists. There is regular and ongoing discourse between the press and politicians. That is what happens in a democracy.”

Israel’s Supreme court ordered the Prime Minister to release the phone records on 7 August. The Court accepted an appeal by Channel 10 journalist Raviv Drucker who claimed that the revelation of Netanyahu’s conversations with Adelson and Regev will make it possible to determine whether the Prime Minister sought more preferable coverage with the newspaper.

The Court said that “this is not a mere matter of gossip over the connection between a member of the government and the owner or editor of a newspaper. The connection between the Prime Minister and Israel Hayom, a popular and influential daily newspaper, has been on the public agenda and has preoccupied the public and the political establishment almost since the newspaper was founded in 2007”.

In the Facebook post Netanyahu repeated his opposition in principle to revealing the details of conversations held between politicians and members of the press. He said that such interventions “in the complex relationship between the press and politicians does not do a service to democracy, rather the opposite,” and requested that the High Court hold another hearing on the matter.