POSTED: 6:47 am PDT April 23, 2007
UPDATED: 7:01 am PDT April 23, 2007
MOSCOW -- Russian news agencies, citing the Kremlin, said former President Boris Yeltsin has died.
A Kremlin spokesman has confirmed to The Associated Press that the 76-year-old Yeltsin has died, but gave no cause of death or further information.
Yeltsin engineered the final collapse of the Soviet Union and pushed Russia to embrace democracy and a market economy.
Yeltsin was the first president of the Russian Federation from 1991-99, following the break-up of the Soviet Union.
Refresh this story for further updates.
Distributed by Internet Broadcasting Systems, Inc. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Showing posts with label President. Show all posts
Showing posts with label President. Show all posts
Monday, April 23, 2007
Thursday, March 29, 2007
Police question Israeli President for allegedly raping accuser more than once
Last update - 19:13 29/03/2007
Katsav questioned for allegedly raping accuser more than once
By Yuval Yoaz, Haaretz Correspondent and Haaretz Service
Police questioned President Moshe Katsav under caution at his official residence in Jerusalem on Thursday, in the wake of a new complaint against the president alleging additional sex crimes.
The complaint was lodged by a former Tourism Ministry employee, who had earlier accused the President of rape. According to the new complaint, Katsav allegedly raped twice, though she did not mention the second allegation in her initial testimony.
During the questioning, Katsav denied the allegation, which allegedly occurred while A. was employeed at the Tourism Ministry during Katsav's tenure as minister. According to the draft indictment, Katsav allegedly raped the woman and forced her into her other sexual activities.
In its official statement, the police wrote only that Katsav has been investigated for alleged sexual crimes.
Earlier Thursday, Zion Amir, one of Katsav's attorneys, said the president's legal team would consider filing a request for the rape and sexual harassment case to be dismissed following the broadcast of an investigative report on allegations against his client.
"I am satisfied because the investigation today proves the President's innocence, and undermines the version of the complainant," Amir said.
The Channel 2 news program "Fact" broadcast new allegations Wednesday from women who had worked with Katsav while he was minister of transportation.
The attorneys said the request would be filed due to Katsav's "premature sentencing by the media."
"Considering what happened yesterday evening, we will take advantage of the holiday recess to consider filing a request to end legal proceedings due to [Katsav's] premature sentencing at the hands of the media," Amir told Israel Radio.
"We will consider how to base this from a legal perspective, at which stage to do it and which steps to take. If he is accused in the media and convicted in the media, there no judge made of flesh and blood who can verify these proceedings without the harmful influence that has seeped under the skin of everyone here," he said.
Amir said it was now impossible to resolve the cast justly, and that the judicial system must be "cleaned out."
A former clerk in the ministry said that once a week she and Katsav went to a Tel Aviv hotel room rented by his associates, with only the two of them present.
It also emerged that Katsav participated in gambling trips abroad organized by associate Reuven Gavrieli, and was present at meetings initiated by another associate, David Havi, which were also attended by convicted drug kingpin Ze'ev Rosenstein.
N., one of the complainants against the president, told the program, "it began as a paternal and attentive relationship. One day he told me, 'I didn't sleep because of you last night.'"
"He said there were intimate moments during which he dreamed about me," she said.
She said that during one of the times they were alone together in his office, he asked her to touch him sexually, but she refused.
Another employee said many of the employees knew about what was occurring, including advisers, drivers, assistants and secretaries.
"Everyone knew that there were hours in which there was 'no entry' to the office. Everyone knew who was the 'favorite on duty,'" she said.
Katsav's attorneys, Amir and Avigdor Feldman, said the statements are incorrect. They said A., Katsav's secretary - who was featured in the program - was described by investigators as a "liar," and that her friend told them she had told her about an affair she was having with Katsav.
Attorneys also said they would file a slander suit against Ilana Dayan, the host of the program, who harmed the president's image on the eve of his hearing with Attorney General Menachem Mazuz.
Katsav questioned on new sexual harassment allegations
Katsav was summoned by police for additional questioning on Thursday, after a new complaint of sexual harassment was recently filed against him.
It appears that one of the women who had complained against the president in the past has recently complained of another harassment incident, which the police did not know of.
Mazuz approved the police request to summon Katsav for further questioning, although the complaint had been filed after a hearing was scheduled for the president on May 2.
Following the hearing, Mazuz will make a final decision on whether or not to indict the president.
The police investigation team notified Amir of the additional interview yesterday and of the nature of the complaint, but did not provide details.
The president refused the police's demand to interview him at the police station or in a "neutral place." Mazuz then permitted the police to interview Katsav at the President's Residence in Jerusalem.
"This is very strange," Amir said yesterday. "The complainant will have to explain why she remembered now, close to the president's hearing, and whether anyone is behind this new complaint of hers."
Last week, Katsav petitioned the High Court of Justice, demanding that the state provide all materials collected in the investigation against him on suspicion of rape and other sexual assault charges.
Katsav's attorneys are questioning the legality of the president's investigation, claiming that all the material against him was illegally obtained.
The president's attorneys, argued in the petition Katsav's hearing before Mazuz is critical to his legal battle.
Katsav questioned for allegedly raping accuser more than once
By Yuval Yoaz, Haaretz Correspondent and Haaretz Service
Police questioned President Moshe Katsav under caution at his official residence in Jerusalem on Thursday, in the wake of a new complaint against the president alleging additional sex crimes.
The complaint was lodged by a former Tourism Ministry employee, who had earlier accused the President of rape. According to the new complaint, Katsav allegedly raped twice, though she did not mention the second allegation in her initial testimony.
During the questioning, Katsav denied the allegation, which allegedly occurred while A. was employeed at the Tourism Ministry during Katsav's tenure as minister. According to the draft indictment, Katsav allegedly raped the woman and forced her into her other sexual activities.
In its official statement, the police wrote only that Katsav has been investigated for alleged sexual crimes.
Earlier Thursday, Zion Amir, one of Katsav's attorneys, said the president's legal team would consider filing a request for the rape and sexual harassment case to be dismissed following the broadcast of an investigative report on allegations against his client.
"I am satisfied because the investigation today proves the President's innocence, and undermines the version of the complainant," Amir said.
The Channel 2 news program "Fact" broadcast new allegations Wednesday from women who had worked with Katsav while he was minister of transportation.
The attorneys said the request would be filed due to Katsav's "premature sentencing by the media."
"Considering what happened yesterday evening, we will take advantage of the holiday recess to consider filing a request to end legal proceedings due to [Katsav's] premature sentencing at the hands of the media," Amir told Israel Radio.
"We will consider how to base this from a legal perspective, at which stage to do it and which steps to take. If he is accused in the media and convicted in the media, there no judge made of flesh and blood who can verify these proceedings without the harmful influence that has seeped under the skin of everyone here," he said.
Amir said it was now impossible to resolve the cast justly, and that the judicial system must be "cleaned out."
A former clerk in the ministry said that once a week she and Katsav went to a Tel Aviv hotel room rented by his associates, with only the two of them present.
It also emerged that Katsav participated in gambling trips abroad organized by associate Reuven Gavrieli, and was present at meetings initiated by another associate, David Havi, which were also attended by convicted drug kingpin Ze'ev Rosenstein.
N., one of the complainants against the president, told the program, "it began as a paternal and attentive relationship. One day he told me, 'I didn't sleep because of you last night.'"
"He said there were intimate moments during which he dreamed about me," she said.
She said that during one of the times they were alone together in his office, he asked her to touch him sexually, but she refused.
Another employee said many of the employees knew about what was occurring, including advisers, drivers, assistants and secretaries.
"Everyone knew that there were hours in which there was 'no entry' to the office. Everyone knew who was the 'favorite on duty,'" she said.
Katsav's attorneys, Amir and Avigdor Feldman, said the statements are incorrect. They said A., Katsav's secretary - who was featured in the program - was described by investigators as a "liar," and that her friend told them she had told her about an affair she was having with Katsav.
Attorneys also said they would file a slander suit against Ilana Dayan, the host of the program, who harmed the president's image on the eve of his hearing with Attorney General Menachem Mazuz.
Katsav questioned on new sexual harassment allegations
Katsav was summoned by police for additional questioning on Thursday, after a new complaint of sexual harassment was recently filed against him.
It appears that one of the women who had complained against the president in the past has recently complained of another harassment incident, which the police did not know of.
Mazuz approved the police request to summon Katsav for further questioning, although the complaint had been filed after a hearing was scheduled for the president on May 2.
Following the hearing, Mazuz will make a final decision on whether or not to indict the president.
The police investigation team notified Amir of the additional interview yesterday and of the nature of the complaint, but did not provide details.
The president refused the police's demand to interview him at the police station or in a "neutral place." Mazuz then permitted the police to interview Katsav at the President's Residence in Jerusalem.
"This is very strange," Amir said yesterday. "The complainant will have to explain why she remembered now, close to the president's hearing, and whether anyone is behind this new complaint of hers."
Last week, Katsav petitioned the High Court of Justice, demanding that the state provide all materials collected in the investigation against him on suspicion of rape and other sexual assault charges.
Katsav's attorneys are questioning the legality of the president's investigation, claiming that all the material against him was illegally obtained.
The president's attorneys, argued in the petition Katsav's hearing before Mazuz is critical to his legal battle.
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
The Road Map to Despotism
Related
Totalitarianism and Obedience
---Posted on Feb 11, 2007
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| usamotalarian.no |
Editor’s note: Despite spending an estimated $80 million, the government was unable to prove that Dr. Sami Al-Arian was a terrorist, yet he remains in prison and his sentence will likely be extended. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Chris Hedges warns that the abusive imprisonment of this nonviolent Palestinian dissenter does not bode well for the rest of us.
Professor Sami Al-Arian, whose persecution and show trial are parts of a long string of egregious acts of injustice perpetrated by the Bush administration, has been on a hunger strike since Jan. 22 to protest the prolongation of his imprisonment.
Al-Arian’s travels through the halls of American justice, and now the subterranean corridors of the nation’s Stygian prison system, reads like a bad rip-off of Kafka. Al-Arian was acquitted on eight of the 17 counts against him by a Florida jury, which deadlocked on the rest. He agreed to plead guilty to one of the remaining charges four months later in exchange for being released and deported. The judge gave Al-Arian as much prison time as possible under a plea deal—57 months at his sentencing. He was set to be released this April, something that now appears unlikely.
The trial was a stinging rebuke to the Bush administration’s drive to turn the American judicial system into kangaroo courts. Over the six-month trial a parade of 80 witnesses, including 21 from Israel, attempted to brand the Florida professor as a terrorist. The government submitted thousands of documents, phone interceptions and physical surveillance culled from 12 years of investigations. The trial cost taxpayers an estimated $80 million. The 94 charges against Al-Arian and his co-defendants resulted in no convictions. But because Al-Arian has twice refused to testify before a grand jury in Virginia in a case involving a Muslim think tank, he has now been charged with contempt of court. The date of his release could be extended by as much as 18 months.
Al-Arian, who is a diabetic, began a hunger strike in response.
“I believe that freedom and human dignity are more precious than life itself,” he said in a telephone interview from Northern Neck Regional Jail in Warsaw, Va. “In, essence I am taking a principled stand that I am willing to endure whatever it takes to win my freedom.
“I am still OK,” he said. “I have lost 26 pounds by today. It’s definitely not easy, but I am determined to continue. It’s not a decision you make haphazardly or something that you take lightly. In the end, you have to make difficult decisions because of the larger cause. I drink four large cups of water a day, about 12 ounces each.”
Dr. Al-Arian said he will remain on a hunger strike until the government ends its campaign against him and allows him to return to his wife and children.
The case and continued harassment sets a dangerous precedent for American Muslims, who since 9/11 have been monitored, detained and deported in large numbers. But it bodes ill for the rest of us as well. The new legislation suspending habeas corpus and creating the possibility of legally stripping U.S. citizens of their right to a fair and timely trial is a taste of what awaits us all should we enter a period of instability or national crisis. In many ways the assault against Al-Arian is an assault against the judicial system that lies like a barrier between us and despotism.
“Much of the government’s evidence against me were speeches I gave, lectures I presented, articles I wrote, magazines I edited, books I owned, conferences I convened, rallies I attended, interviews I conducted, news I heard and websites no one accessed...In one instance, the evidence consisted of a conversation that one of my co-defendants had with me in his dream,” he said. “It was reminiscent of the thought crime of Orwell’s ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four.’ The scary part was not that these were offered into evidence, but that a federal judge admitted them. That’s why I am so proud of the jury, who acted as the free people that they were and saw through Big Brother’s tactics.
“I’ve been to nine prisons in nine months,” he explained. “I spent the first 23 months in Coleman Federal Penitentiary, where the conditions were Guantanamo-plus, that is they were like those of the detainees in Guantanamo Bay ‘plus’ one phone call a month and visits with my family behind glass. I was in a nine-foot-by-eight-foot cell, where I was held under 23-hour lockdown. During the first few months, they wouldn’t even allow me to exercise unless I was strip-searched, which I refused to submit to, so I was inside 24 hours. During the first month, I was allowed only one 15-minute phone call, and for six months after that I was not allowed to make any calls.
“I was shackled and handcuffed every single time I left my cell for any reason,” he said. “When I needed to take my legal papers for meetings with my attorney, the guards would not carry them for me, even though they did for other prisoners. Though I was shackled, they forced me to carry them on my back, as I was bent over. I had to walk like that for half a mile. I should also mention the use of fire alarms in trying to disrupt life. In the Special Housing Unit [SHU], a punitive section of the prison where I was the only pretrial detainee, alarms and emergency sirens would go off 15 to 20 times every single day, at 12 a.m., 2 p.m., any time of the day. It was a deafening noise that would continue for five to 10 minutes. It was clearly deliberate. In the SHU, commissary was almost nonexistent. All they offered was potato chips, whereas in the general compound everything was available. The SHU was designed for disciplinary purposes, not for housing a pretrial detainee.
“Not only did they place me in the SHU, but they imposed additional restrictions on me,” he went on. “For instance, everybody else was granted contact visits, while I had to see my family behind glass. They also insisted on strip-searching me before and after these behind-the-glass visits. In May 2003, my wife drove two hours to see me, but they denied her the visit when I would not submit to a strip search.”
Al-Arian is a Palestinian. The injustice meted out to him in America is writ large in the Middle East. He has no passport, no home, no country. He must live on the charity of others, stateless, as most Palestinians are, and without the rights of the citizens around him. He once thought America would be his home. He was, before this charade, in the process of gaining citizenship. All this is over. In George Bush’s America there is no place for activists or dissidents. And when they finish with those on the margins of our society they will turn, if we let them, on the rest of us.
Chris HedgesSunday, February 11, 2007
"I was scared. Who would believe the Israeli president raped me?"
February 11, 2007
Marie Colvin, Tel Aviv
IN A hotel room in Tel Aviv, a young assistant who worked in the office of Moshe Katsav, the Israeli president, is acting out the moves she claims he made when he raped her.
“I went into his office with a book I needed to put away,” she said. “He was sitting at his desk and there’s a big wall of books behind him. I was reaching up to put the book away when he came up behind me.”
She crosses her hands on her stomach and hunches. You can almost see the big arms trapping her hands under his.
“He was behind me in a kind of hug,” she continued. “It was like my hands were tied. He is not a big person but he is strong. I said: what are you doing?
“I don’t know why I said that. I was shocked. He said, ‘I want you. I want you to love me. Why don’t you love me? I want to have sex with you’. I think I said again: what are you doing?”
Katsav pushed her onto the corner of his desk, she claims. She rises from her chair to demonstrate how her hips were allegedly forced on to the table as he turned her to face him.
“My hands were on the table and his hands were over mine on the table. I’m not weak. [But] I had this feeling I never felt before — you can’t do anything.
“Before I even understood, he opened his belt [she starts unbuckling hers to demonstrate] and he pulled up my skirt. I started saying: I’m leaving, I’m quitting. I was sure that he would stop.”
She draws on a cigarette and grimaces. “Maybe I didn’t struggle enough,” she said. “I was shocked. I was thinking, what if people know, what if I don’t have a job. He penetrated me.” The alleged attack lasted minutes, she said. “One leg was out of my panties and I put it back in. And I pulled them up and I just went out of his office. I took my purse from my desk and I just went.”
She has been seeing a psycho-therapist for six months and says that it has given her a new perspective. “I didn’t shout. But I did say no, strongly. I know I did. I said: don’t touch me.” Afterwards, she says, he warned her: “Don’t tell anyone.”
She went to a public garden nearby and sat for hours, she says, smoking one cigarette after another before taking a taxi home. It was sunny but windy. “I was thinking, why me? What did I do wrong? Did I do something wrong? I saw my life ruined in just one moment.”
Calls to her mobile went unanswered. “I took a shower and went to bed,” she said. “I wanted to wash away his touch. He was all over me.”
The young woman, who bears a resemblance to the actress Michelle Pfeiffer in Chanel tortoiseshell glasses, now divides her life into two parts: before and after the alleged rape.
Before, her interests were simple. She says she loved her job. She had a boyfriend and a car and she socialised when she could outside the long hours of the president’s office.
Now, she shies away from the company of all but good friends. “I don’t listen to music any more, I don’t go shopping. I’m not the same person,” she said last week.
The president vigorously protests his innocence of her allegations, saying that years had gone by before she made them and vowing to fight until his last breath to clear his name. Nevertheless, he is facing indictments not only for rape but also for charges of sexual misconduct against three other women.
The young assistant, who cannot be named by law, is at the centre of a swirl of sexual and financial scandals in the Israeli government that have brought public confidence in the country’s leaders to an all-time low.
Haim Ramon, the justice minister, was forced to step down last summer. Last month he was convicted of committing an indecent act by forcibly kissing a 20-year-old female soldier as he arrived at the prime minister’s office for a meeting on the day when Israel decided to go to war against Hezbollah.
The prime minister himself, Ehud Olmert, faces inquiries into his alleged role in promoting the interests of two friends in the privatisation of a bank and also over claims of corruption in property deals.
However, it is the sex scandal surrounding 61-year-old Katsav that is gripping the nation.
In a speech broadcast live on Israeli television, he claimed that there was a conspiracy against him by the police, the prosecutors and the media. Then he got into a shouting match with a Channel 2 correspondent who had tried to ask him a question.
Katsav’s duties as president are largely ceremonial but he is a symbol of the nation. He beat Shimon Peres, the nation’s elder statesman, to the post in 2000 although he had held only second-rank posts in successive governments of the right-wing party Likud. One newspaper said that he “rose simply by being too dull to make enemies”.
Katsav, the first Israeli president from a Muslim country, was born in Yazd, Iran, and came to Israel at the age of six, joining the hundreds of thousands of Jews emigrating after the 1948 war that ended with the foundation of the Jewish state. At a modest bungalow in Kiryat Malachi, he and his wife Gila have raised five children.
The assistant joined Katsav’s staff soon after he became president and did menial work before rising to a more responsible job. She was young, naive, poorly educated and in awe of the president. Looking back, she claims that she can now see that his advances began gradually.
“The president would call me on my private line,” she said. “He would stop by my desk and say, ‘You look pretty’, or ‘I like your skirt’.”
It was flattering to have the attention of such a powerful man, but matters soon became uncomfortable. “He would stand too close or seek out my company too much. I thought, well, it’s only talk. What can I say? I didn’t want to lose my job. My father is not a Rothschild.”
Katsav’s questions became increasingly personal. She once walked out of his office when he asked what she liked to do in bed, she claims, but she says she could not confront him.
Her days grew longer. She would start at 8:30am, meeting the president when he came back from early morning prayers at the synagogue next door. Sometimes she would stay in the office until 11pm at his request.
Katsav, she said, would go upstairs at the end of the working day and return in a tracksuit, asking her to sit and watch the news with him. “I didn’t know if it was part of the job,” she said.
“I was dating someone and it ruined that a lot, because I didn’t have so much time.”
He constantly rang her on her mobile phone, she claims, sometimes starting at 7.30am as she headed into work and finishing late at night.
Sometimes he would discuss colleagues in intimate terms, for instance, telling her that one of them was gay. At other times he berated her for incompetence.
“It made me nervous,” she said. One day, she alleges, he crossed the line of acceptable behaviour. She was sitting in front of his desk taking instructions, when he walked around and stood next to her.
“He said, ‘Stand for a second’. And I don’t know, instinctively I stood up. He put his hand on my breast, like this,” she said, dem-onstrating a cupping motion. “I said: what are you doing? And I froze.”
She left and stayed away for two days. “He kept calling and saying, ‘It’s okay, I’m not going to touch you, if you don’t like it that’s okay’. I was confused. I couldn’t really know what happened. But I started thinking that I need to think about another job.”
Now she believes she should have done precisely that. Just a few weeks later she went into his office to return the book, with all the consequences that she says have changed her life.
She knows it seems suspicious that she walked out for 10 days after the alleged rape and then came back to work for a month before fleeing the country.
She struggles to explain herself, but says she had resolved to put the rape behind her and try to survive in a situation that had overwhelmed her.
Asked why she did not report the rape, she ponders for a moment. Then the words come pouring out.
“I thought, who would believe me? I was scared, ashamed. I didn’t want anyone to know. He was calling and threatening me, saying, ‘Don’t tell anyone. If you do, you will never even work as a waitress again’.
“Then he would call and say, ‘I don’t have an assistant. Where is your professional responsibility?’
“I worked there again knowing I was going to leave,” she said. “I had to prepare my parents, sell my car. I had a life to cut off.” She added: “If nothing bad happened to me like they say, why would I leave my dream job?” She stayed away from Israel for several months. The manner of her return has raised further questions about her account.
She says she contacted Katsav because she needed a reference and in return he asked her to write a letter of appreciation for her time in his office. He then offered to set up three job interviews for her.
“I knew it was not a good solution,” she said. “He could never fix what he did to me, but I thought if he wants to do this little thing, I will accept it. I need a job.”
A confrontation with Katsav followed in his office when he had failed to arrange a single interview after four months: “I was excited. I could have killed him at that moment. It felt like he was still driving into my body.”
By then, she claims, someone – a journalist, she believes – had come into an office where she was on menial duties, offering her $500,000 for her story.
According to her account, she told Katsav about this during their confrontation, which was taped. The exchange culminated in her shouting: “Not even for $2m would I forget what you did to me.”
By now, other claims of sexual misconduct were beginning to circulate and the president approached Menachem Mazuz, the attorney-general, claiming he was being blackmailed.
This prompted a police investigation during which 10 women, including three who had worked at the residence, made allegations against him.
The police said they had enough evidence to indict in four alleged cases, including one of rape and one of “forced sexual intercourse involving abuse of authority”, which is said to apply when the victim did not tell anyone at the time.
The attorney-general is expected to make a final decision on indictments later this year after hearing an appeal from Katsav.
Olmert has urged Katsav to resign and Mazuz ordered him to move out of the official residence. Last month the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, approved his suspension from the presidency for three months.
Katsav spent the time in his bungalow, reading through the black folders in five boxes of testimony taken by the police, preparing his defence. Some of the stories are said to be similar to those of the traumatised young woman I interviewed.
She has no money to pay a lawyer; nor do the other women. But they have found people t o believe in them. One of the mos t prominent is Kinneret Barashi, a lawyer working for one of the main complainants, known a s woman “A”.
“I didn’t know I would be taking on the whole establishment with no budget,” said Barashi, who has practised law for only five years. “It started for me with my belief. My client is my friend and from the moment she told me I knew she wasn’t lying.”
Katsav denies that he touched anyone. Last week he cancelled a promised interview with The Sunday Times at the last mom -
ent and sent Lior Katsav, his brother and legal adviser, to put his case.
“The president feels like he is a victim of the media, the police and some of the politicians in Israel,” said Lior Katsav.
“He believes he did not do anything wrong. For six years as president there were no complaints. Why now?”
Lior Katsav clearly believes in his brother: “He feels the damage against him and the office is unbelievable and unjustifiable.”
The two women who had alleged rape were out for revenge, he said; the others had been manipulated by the police. “One, he kissed her on the cheek on her birthday, and she didn’t think anything of it until the police convinced her she had been sexually harassed,” he said.
The young assistant is equally vehement. “It was not a classic rape, where someone grabs you by the hair and drags you into the woods,” she said. “But it is not less hard when you know the person who rapes you.”
She added: “I’m waiting for my day in court. This is my chance. I’m afraid a little bit, but I know I can tell what happened to me and no one can take that away from me. I was there and I know the truth.”
Fingers point at other politicians
Other Israeli leaders tainted by allegations of sleaze:
- Ehud Olmert, the prime minister, has been accused of corruption in Jerusalem property deals. It is alleged that he received payment for a house above the true market value.
- Omri Sharon, son of Ariel Sharon, the former prime minister. Sentenced to nine months’ jail last year on corruption charges. Between July 1999 and February 2000 he received $1.3m for his father’s campaign to lead the Likud party, far in excess of the permitted limit.
- Tzahi Hanegbi, chairman of the Knesset’s foreign affairs and defence committee. Indicted last year on charges of fraud, bribery, providing false testimony and lying under oath — all related to unlawful appointments he allegedly made while a government minister.
- Ezer Weizman, former president. Received $450,000 in gifts from Edouard Saroussi, the French millionaire, in the 1980s when he was a minister. Public criticism forced his resignation in July 2000. He died in 2005.
- Haim Ramon resigned as justice minister after being charged with sexual misconduct. He was found guilty last month of forcibly kissing a woman soldier.
Marie Colvin, Tel Aviv
IN A hotel room in Tel Aviv, a young assistant who worked in the office of Moshe Katsav, the Israeli president, is acting out the moves she claims he made when he raped her.
“I went into his office with a book I needed to put away,” she said. “He was sitting at his desk and there’s a big wall of books behind him. I was reaching up to put the book away when he came up behind me.”
She crosses her hands on her stomach and hunches. You can almost see the big arms trapping her hands under his.
“He was behind me in a kind of hug,” she continued. “It was like my hands were tied. He is not a big person but he is strong. I said: what are you doing?
“I don’t know why I said that. I was shocked. He said, ‘I want you. I want you to love me. Why don’t you love me? I want to have sex with you’. I think I said again: what are you doing?”
Katsav pushed her onto the corner of his desk, she claims. She rises from her chair to demonstrate how her hips were allegedly forced on to the table as he turned her to face him.
“My hands were on the table and his hands were over mine on the table. I’m not weak. [But] I had this feeling I never felt before — you can’t do anything.
“Before I even understood, he opened his belt [she starts unbuckling hers to demonstrate] and he pulled up my skirt. I started saying: I’m leaving, I’m quitting. I was sure that he would stop.”
She draws on a cigarette and grimaces. “Maybe I didn’t struggle enough,” she said. “I was shocked. I was thinking, what if people know, what if I don’t have a job. He penetrated me.” The alleged attack lasted minutes, she said. “One leg was out of my panties and I put it back in. And I pulled them up and I just went out of his office. I took my purse from my desk and I just went.”
She has been seeing a psycho-therapist for six months and says that it has given her a new perspective. “I didn’t shout. But I did say no, strongly. I know I did. I said: don’t touch me.” Afterwards, she says, he warned her: “Don’t tell anyone.”
She went to a public garden nearby and sat for hours, she says, smoking one cigarette after another before taking a taxi home. It was sunny but windy. “I was thinking, why me? What did I do wrong? Did I do something wrong? I saw my life ruined in just one moment.”
Calls to her mobile went unanswered. “I took a shower and went to bed,” she said. “I wanted to wash away his touch. He was all over me.”
The young woman, who bears a resemblance to the actress Michelle Pfeiffer in Chanel tortoiseshell glasses, now divides her life into two parts: before and after the alleged rape.
Before, her interests were simple. She says she loved her job. She had a boyfriend and a car and she socialised when she could outside the long hours of the president’s office.
Now, she shies away from the company of all but good friends. “I don’t listen to music any more, I don’t go shopping. I’m not the same person,” she said last week.
The president vigorously protests his innocence of her allegations, saying that years had gone by before she made them and vowing to fight until his last breath to clear his name. Nevertheless, he is facing indictments not only for rape but also for charges of sexual misconduct against three other women.
The young assistant, who cannot be named by law, is at the centre of a swirl of sexual and financial scandals in the Israeli government that have brought public confidence in the country’s leaders to an all-time low.
Haim Ramon, the justice minister, was forced to step down last summer. Last month he was convicted of committing an indecent act by forcibly kissing a 20-year-old female soldier as he arrived at the prime minister’s office for a meeting on the day when Israel decided to go to war against Hezbollah.
The prime minister himself, Ehud Olmert, faces inquiries into his alleged role in promoting the interests of two friends in the privatisation of a bank and also over claims of corruption in property deals.
However, it is the sex scandal surrounding 61-year-old Katsav that is gripping the nation.
In a speech broadcast live on Israeli television, he claimed that there was a conspiracy against him by the police, the prosecutors and the media. Then he got into a shouting match with a Channel 2 correspondent who had tried to ask him a question.
Katsav’s duties as president are largely ceremonial but he is a symbol of the nation. He beat Shimon Peres, the nation’s elder statesman, to the post in 2000 although he had held only second-rank posts in successive governments of the right-wing party Likud. One newspaper said that he “rose simply by being too dull to make enemies”.
Katsav, the first Israeli president from a Muslim country, was born in Yazd, Iran, and came to Israel at the age of six, joining the hundreds of thousands of Jews emigrating after the 1948 war that ended with the foundation of the Jewish state. At a modest bungalow in Kiryat Malachi, he and his wife Gila have raised five children.
The assistant joined Katsav’s staff soon after he became president and did menial work before rising to a more responsible job. She was young, naive, poorly educated and in awe of the president. Looking back, she claims that she can now see that his advances began gradually.
“The president would call me on my private line,” she said. “He would stop by my desk and say, ‘You look pretty’, or ‘I like your skirt’.”
It was flattering to have the attention of such a powerful man, but matters soon became uncomfortable. “He would stand too close or seek out my company too much. I thought, well, it’s only talk. What can I say? I didn’t want to lose my job. My father is not a Rothschild.”
Katsav’s questions became increasingly personal. She once walked out of his office when he asked what she liked to do in bed, she claims, but she says she could not confront him.
Her days grew longer. She would start at 8:30am, meeting the president when he came back from early morning prayers at the synagogue next door. Sometimes she would stay in the office until 11pm at his request.
Katsav, she said, would go upstairs at the end of the working day and return in a tracksuit, asking her to sit and watch the news with him. “I didn’t know if it was part of the job,” she said.
“I was dating someone and it ruined that a lot, because I didn’t have so much time.”
He constantly rang her on her mobile phone, she claims, sometimes starting at 7.30am as she headed into work and finishing late at night.
Sometimes he would discuss colleagues in intimate terms, for instance, telling her that one of them was gay. At other times he berated her for incompetence.
“It made me nervous,” she said. One day, she alleges, he crossed the line of acceptable behaviour. She was sitting in front of his desk taking instructions, when he walked around and stood next to her.
“He said, ‘Stand for a second’. And I don’t know, instinctively I stood up. He put his hand on my breast, like this,” she said, dem-onstrating a cupping motion. “I said: what are you doing? And I froze.”
She left and stayed away for two days. “He kept calling and saying, ‘It’s okay, I’m not going to touch you, if you don’t like it that’s okay’. I was confused. I couldn’t really know what happened. But I started thinking that I need to think about another job.”
Now she believes she should have done precisely that. Just a few weeks later she went into his office to return the book, with all the consequences that she says have changed her life.
She knows it seems suspicious that she walked out for 10 days after the alleged rape and then came back to work for a month before fleeing the country.
She struggles to explain herself, but says she had resolved to put the rape behind her and try to survive in a situation that had overwhelmed her.
Asked why she did not report the rape, she ponders for a moment. Then the words come pouring out.
“I thought, who would believe me? I was scared, ashamed. I didn’t want anyone to know. He was calling and threatening me, saying, ‘Don’t tell anyone. If you do, you will never even work as a waitress again’.
“Then he would call and say, ‘I don’t have an assistant. Where is your professional responsibility?’
“I worked there again knowing I was going to leave,” she said. “I had to prepare my parents, sell my car. I had a life to cut off.” She added: “If nothing bad happened to me like they say, why would I leave my dream job?” She stayed away from Israel for several months. The manner of her return has raised further questions about her account.
She says she contacted Katsav because she needed a reference and in return he asked her to write a letter of appreciation for her time in his office. He then offered to set up three job interviews for her.
“I knew it was not a good solution,” she said. “He could never fix what he did to me, but I thought if he wants to do this little thing, I will accept it. I need a job.”
A confrontation with Katsav followed in his office when he had failed to arrange a single interview after four months: “I was excited. I could have killed him at that moment. It felt like he was still driving into my body.”
By then, she claims, someone – a journalist, she believes – had come into an office where she was on menial duties, offering her $500,000 for her story.
According to her account, she told Katsav about this during their confrontation, which was taped. The exchange culminated in her shouting: “Not even for $2m would I forget what you did to me.”
By now, other claims of sexual misconduct were beginning to circulate and the president approached Menachem Mazuz, the attorney-general, claiming he was being blackmailed.
This prompted a police investigation during which 10 women, including three who had worked at the residence, made allegations against him.
The police said they had enough evidence to indict in four alleged cases, including one of rape and one of “forced sexual intercourse involving abuse of authority”, which is said to apply when the victim did not tell anyone at the time.
The attorney-general is expected to make a final decision on indictments later this year after hearing an appeal from Katsav.
Olmert has urged Katsav to resign and Mazuz ordered him to move out of the official residence. Last month the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, approved his suspension from the presidency for three months.
Katsav spent the time in his bungalow, reading through the black folders in five boxes of testimony taken by the police, preparing his defence. Some of the stories are said to be similar to those of the traumatised young woman I interviewed.
She has no money to pay a lawyer; nor do the other women. But they have found people t o believe in them. One of the mos t prominent is Kinneret Barashi, a lawyer working for one of the main complainants, known a s woman “A”.
“I didn’t know I would be taking on the whole establishment with no budget,” said Barashi, who has practised law for only five years. “It started for me with my belief. My client is my friend and from the moment she told me I knew she wasn’t lying.”
Katsav denies that he touched anyone. Last week he cancelled a promised interview with The Sunday Times at the last mom -
ent and sent Lior Katsav, his brother and legal adviser, to put his case.
“The president feels like he is a victim of the media, the police and some of the politicians in Israel,” said Lior Katsav.
“He believes he did not do anything wrong. For six years as president there were no complaints. Why now?”
Lior Katsav clearly believes in his brother: “He feels the damage against him and the office is unbelievable and unjustifiable.”
The two women who had alleged rape were out for revenge, he said; the others had been manipulated by the police. “One, he kissed her on the cheek on her birthday, and she didn’t think anything of it until the police convinced her she had been sexually harassed,” he said.
The young assistant is equally vehement. “It was not a classic rape, where someone grabs you by the hair and drags you into the woods,” she said. “But it is not less hard when you know the person who rapes you.”
She added: “I’m waiting for my day in court. This is my chance. I’m afraid a little bit, but I know I can tell what happened to me and no one can take that away from me. I was there and I know the truth.”
Fingers point at other politicians
Other Israeli leaders tainted by allegations of sleaze:
- Ehud Olmert, the prime minister, has been accused of corruption in Jerusalem property deals. It is alleged that he received payment for a house above the true market value.
- Omri Sharon, son of Ariel Sharon, the former prime minister. Sentenced to nine months’ jail last year on corruption charges. Between July 1999 and February 2000 he received $1.3m for his father’s campaign to lead the Likud party, far in excess of the permitted limit.
- Tzahi Hanegbi, chairman of the Knesset’s foreign affairs and defence committee. Indicted last year on charges of fraud, bribery, providing false testimony and lying under oath — all related to unlawful appointments he allegedly made while a government minister.
- Ezer Weizman, former president. Received $450,000 in gifts from Edouard Saroussi, the French millionaire, in the 1980s when he was a minister. Public criticism forced his resignation in July 2000. He died in 2005.
- Haim Ramon resigned as justice minister after being charged with sexual misconduct. He was found guilty last month of forcibly kissing a woman soldier.
Thursday, January 25, 2007
Israeli President blames media for rape claim
Katsav blames media for rape claim
By Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem
Published: 25 January 2007
An emotional Israeli President, Moshe Katsav, sought to face down mounting clamour for his resignation yesterday and merely suspended himself pending final confirmation of a decision to indict him on rape and sexual harassment charges.
Mr Katsav launched a tirade against the "media lynch", that he claimed lay behind the accusations and pleaded with Israelis not to believe the "terrible lie" that he had raped a woman who worked for him and committed sexual offences against three female employees. Earlier, the President had announced that he was declaring himself temporarily "incapacitated" in the face of the stated intention of Menachem Mazuz, the Attorney General, to indict him for the sexual offences and for fraud, breach of trust, witness harassment and obstruction of justice. The move means the President will cease for the time being to carry out his largely ceremonial duties.
In a lengthy speech of self-defence during which he frequently denounced the journalists present for seeking to hound him from office, the 61-year-old, who has five children, repeated his promise to resign if the Attorney General confirms the indictment, after a hearing, and not to hide behind the immunity of his office. His term as President is due to end in five months.
This is unlikely to mollify all of those critics calling on him to resign immediately. Their ranks were swelled yesterday by resignation calls from two influential ministers in the ruling Kadima Party, the Foreign Minister, Tzipi Livni, and the Interior Minister, Avi Dichter.
About 30 Knesset members signed a petition yesterday calling for proceedings to remove him from office. The votes of three-quarters of the KnessetÕs 120 legislators would be needed to implement such a call. Saying that he might have been inclined to resign to end his "persecution", the Iranian-born President pledged to clear his name. "I have survived because I know the truth," he declared. "In the court of the media there is no need for proof."
When a television reporter attempted to interrupt with a question the President angrily shouted at him: "You have had your say, itÕs my turn... I did not do any of the deeds of which I am accused. I have conducted my public office with clean hands throughout."
It follows the entirely separate announcement of a police investigation into the role of the Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert, in the privatisation of the Bank Leumi.
By Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem
Published: 25 January 2007
An emotional Israeli President, Moshe Katsav, sought to face down mounting clamour for his resignation yesterday and merely suspended himself pending final confirmation of a decision to indict him on rape and sexual harassment charges.
Mr Katsav launched a tirade against the "media lynch", that he claimed lay behind the accusations and pleaded with Israelis not to believe the "terrible lie" that he had raped a woman who worked for him and committed sexual offences against three female employees. Earlier, the President had announced that he was declaring himself temporarily "incapacitated" in the face of the stated intention of Menachem Mazuz, the Attorney General, to indict him for the sexual offences and for fraud, breach of trust, witness harassment and obstruction of justice. The move means the President will cease for the time being to carry out his largely ceremonial duties.
In a lengthy speech of self-defence during which he frequently denounced the journalists present for seeking to hound him from office, the 61-year-old, who has five children, repeated his promise to resign if the Attorney General confirms the indictment, after a hearing, and not to hide behind the immunity of his office. His term as President is due to end in five months.
This is unlikely to mollify all of those critics calling on him to resign immediately. Their ranks were swelled yesterday by resignation calls from two influential ministers in the ruling Kadima Party, the Foreign Minister, Tzipi Livni, and the Interior Minister, Avi Dichter.
About 30 Knesset members signed a petition yesterday calling for proceedings to remove him from office. The votes of three-quarters of the KnessetÕs 120 legislators would be needed to implement such a call. Saying that he might have been inclined to resign to end his "persecution", the Iranian-born President pledged to clear his name. "I have survived because I know the truth," he declared. "In the court of the media there is no need for proof."
When a television reporter attempted to interrupt with a question the President angrily shouted at him: "You have had your say, itÕs my turn... I did not do any of the deeds of which I am accused. I have conducted my public office with clean hands throughout."
It follows the entirely separate announcement of a police investigation into the role of the Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert, in the privatisation of the Bank Leumi.
Tuesday, December 5, 2006
President Carter talks about AIPAC and Israel on C-SPAN
Call-In In Depth with Jimmy Carter
C-SPAN, BookTV
03:57
Former President Jimmy Carter, author of a new book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid,
is interviewed from his home in Plains, Georgia. He responds to a caller who asks questions concerning pressure put on the US political system and the resulting support of Israel. The caller refers to author James Bamford's book "A Pretext For War" and he asks President Carter about AIPAC and other pressure groups within the US.
President Carter reveals the intense pressures used to prevent public discussion of the facts concerning Israel. He admits that some Universities have actually turned him away, telling him that discussing Israel was "too controversial!"
It is critical to discuss Israel, see this video: What motivated the 9/11 hijackers? See testimony most didn't
We have been paying an enormous price for the US government's support of Israel and we should NOT have to pay it! We should not have our lives put in harm's way because of support of Israel. We are being lied to about what Israel actually has been doing.
The caller mentions this article which says: "The strict immigration policy that Israel is adopting with these laws completely ignores the breadth of possibilities stemming from ties of love and human relationships. Henceforth, the government recommends, through legislation, it is advisable to fall in love only with Jews, or to give up living in Israel."- Fall in love only with Jews by Haaretz Editorial (Haaretz is an Israseli Newspaper).
C-SPAN, BookTV
03:57
Former President Jimmy Carter, author of a new book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid,
is interviewed from his home in Plains, Georgia. He responds to a caller who asks questions concerning pressure put on the US political system and the resulting support of Israel. The caller refers to author James Bamford's book "A Pretext For War" and he asks President Carter about AIPAC and other pressure groups within the US.
President Carter reveals the intense pressures used to prevent public discussion of the facts concerning Israel. He admits that some Universities have actually turned him away, telling him that discussing Israel was "too controversial!"
It is critical to discuss Israel, see this video: What motivated the 9/11 hijackers? See testimony most didn't
We have been paying an enormous price for the US government's support of Israel and we should NOT have to pay it! We should not have our lives put in harm's way because of support of Israel. We are being lied to about what Israel actually has been doing.
The caller mentions this article which says: "The strict immigration policy that Israel is adopting with these laws completely ignores the breadth of possibilities stemming from ties of love and human relationships. Henceforth, the government recommends, through legislation, it is advisable to fall in love only with Jews, or to give up living in Israel."- Fall in love only with Jews by Haaretz Editorial (Haaretz is an Israseli Newspaper).
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