Arnon Milchan described Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as being in a rivalry and political conflict with Yedioth Ahronoth owner Arnon Mozes on Wednesday in his ninth day of testimony for the Israeli leader’s corruption trial.
“Netanyahu is obsessed with media, it is part of his survival,” Milchan told Netanyahu lawyer Amit Haddad, explaining that Mozes was in opposition to Netanyahu’s politics.
Haddad cross-examined Milchan only briefly on Wednesday, handing over the reigns to Mozes’s lawyers to discuss Case 2000, in which Netanyahu and Mozes are alleged to have met to discuss advancing regulations that would handicap Yediot’s news rival Yisrael Hayom in exchange for more positive coverage.
In previous days of testimony, Milchan had recalled how he had attempted to broker peace between the warring newspapers at the behest of Netanyahu. Later Milchan had proposed ideas for the sale of Yediot.
How the day’s proceedings began
At the beginning of the Wednesday testimony, Haddad had asked Milchan about Case 1000, in which the businessman is alleged to have given expensive gifts to Netanyahu, in return for favors, such as aid with a US visa issue and advancement of a tax law extension.
A zoom call during Milchan’s testimony on the ninth day of the Netanyahu trial, July 5, 2023. (credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM)Milchan told Haddad that he had given the Netanyahu family gifts, such as champagne and cigars, about 70% of the time that he had visited. The businessman testified that the gifts were given out of friendship, and if Netanyahu were a bus driver he still would have doted on him.
Over the course of the testimony, Haddad had presented a narrative in which Milchan’s generosity was motivated by an extremely close friendship with Netanyahu, who he said had been given gifts by Milchan even prior to his ascension to the premiership. Haddad argued that many of the issues raised as favors for Milchan were actually motivated by altruistic Zionism and the economic benefit of Israel, or that Netanyahu wasn’t actually involved in the matters.
The trial was broadcast to the Jerusalem District Courthouse from Brighton, United Kingdom. Milchan had said that he was too ill to travel, and at the beginning of the Wednesday testimony said that he was feeling about as well as he looked, but would continue on.
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