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United States President Donald Trump (R) hosts Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (L) in the White House in Washington DC., United States on February 04, 2025. [Avi Ohayon (GPO) /Handout – Anadolu Agency]
The Hebrew newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth reported that the comments made by Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, on Thursday evening were intended to convince US President Donald Trump that he is being persecuted during his trial, in order to push Trump to increase his efforts to grant him a pardon.
On Thursday evening, Netanyahu posted a video on his page on the platform X, speaking in English and claiming that his trial is political, began six years ago, and could continue for another four years.
In the video, he said: “It’s a political trial. They [the prosecutors] are not interested in justice; they are interested in getting me out of office.”
Netanyahu also tried to explain the reasons for his trial, claiming that the investigators told him they were looking into a suspicion of corruption related to two incidents. The first is that his son received a Bugs Bunny toy as a gift 29 years ago, and the second is that he accepted a cigar as a gift from a friend.
According to Yedioth Ahronoth, political sources said that “Netanyahu’s statements in English aim”to convince the American public that he is being persecuted.”
The paper added that Netanyahu is trying to “shape public opinion in the US and pressure President Trump to increase his actions” to grant him a pardon.
Commenting on this, Benny Gantz, the leader of the Blue and White Party, said that Netanyahu is placing his personal interest above the interest of the country.
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Orcas discuss Genocide-supporting and complicit Zionists. Donald Trump, Keith Starmer, David Lammy, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner and Wes Streeting are acknowledged as evil genocide-complicit and supporting cnuts.Keir Starmer objects to criticism of the IDF. He asks how could anyone object to them starving people to death, forced marches like the Nazis did, bombing Gaza’s hospitals and universities, mass-murdering journalists, healthworkers and starving people queuing for food, killing and raping prisoners and murdering children. He calls for people to stop obstructing his genocide for Israel.Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves discuss wasting money including David Lammy spending £1MILLION on private jets.
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a press conference in Jerusalem on December 9, 2024 [MAYA ALLERUZZO/POOL/AFP via Getty Images]
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was re-elected leader of the right-wing Likud Party on Thursday, with the premier nominated as the party’s candidate in the upcoming legislative elections, Anadolu reports.
According to Israeli Channel 14, Netanyahu was re-elected unopposed during a meeting of the party’s Election and Oversight Committee in Tel Aviv.
Under the party’s bylaws, a candidate is automatically elected when only one nomination is submitted, without the need for a vote.
Israel’s upcoming elections are scheduled for Oct. 27, 2026.
Netanyahu has led multiple Israeli governments since first taking office in 1996.
Thursday’s decision signals Netanyahu’s intention to run again despite the ongoing corruption charges against him.
Israeli law does not require him to resign unless convicted by the Supreme Court.
Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpAKeir Starmer objects to criticism of the IDF. He asks how could anyone object to them starving people to death, forced marches like the Nazis did, bombing Gaza’s hospitals and universities, mass-murdering journalists, healthworkers and starving people queuing for food, killing and raping prisoners and murdering children. He calls for people to stop obstructing his genocide for Israel.Orcas discuss Genocide-supporting and complicit Zionists. Donald Trump, Keith Starmer, David Lammy, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner and Wes Streeting are acknowledged as evil genocide-complicit and supporting cnuts.
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The Israeli army demolishes two Palestinian homes in the town of Shuqba, west of Ramallah in the central West Bank on October 28, 2025. [Issam Rimawi – Anadolu Agency]
Israel’s Ministry of Construction and Housing has issued two tenders to build 356 settlement units in the occupied West Bank, an Israeli anti-settlement group said Wednesday, Anadolu reports.
The Peace Now movement, which monitors settlement activity in the West Bank, said in a statement that two tenders were published for the construction of a new settlement neighborhood in the Geva Binyamin settlement, southeast of Ramallah.
The first tender covers 342 housing units across five residential complexes, while the second includes 14 homes designated for reserve soldiers, the movement said.
It noted that an additional tender was published for a residential complex in the Giv’on HaHadasha settlement, south of Ramallah, on Nov. 2.
“Since the beginning of 2025, tenders for building 5,667 housing units in settlements have been published – a record-breaking figure, roughly 50% higher than the previous peak year of 2018, when tenders were issued for 3,808 units,” it said.
“If the tenders published this year are implemented, the new homes will add nearly 25,000 settlers to the West Bank,” it added.
Peace Now accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government of “exploiting every moment in power to destroy Israel’s chances for a future of peace and prosperity,” warning that the expansion of settlements “only deepens the pit Israel must eventually climb out of.”
“While US President Donald Trump declared that there will be no annexation (of the West Bank), the Israeli government is doing everything to realize annexation on the ground and turn Israel into an apartheid state.”
On Oct. 24, Trump told reporters not to worry, saying Israel is “not going to do anything with the West Bank.”
His remarks came a day after the Israeli Knesset (parliament) passed in a preliminary reading two bills to annex the occupied West Bank and the Ma’ale Adumim settlement, a move that would isolate East Jerusalem and divide the West Bank into two separate areas.
The UN has repeatedly affirmed that Israeli settlements in occupied Palestinian territories are illegal under international law, warning that they undermine prospects for a two-state solution.
Palestinians insist on East Jerusalem as the capital of their future state, based on international resolutions that do not recognize Israel’s 1967 occupation or its 1980 annexation of the city.
In a landmark opinion last July, the International Court of Justice declared Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory illegal and called for the evacuation of all settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Orcas discuss Genocide-supporting and complicit Zionists. Donald Trump, Keith Starmer, David Lammy, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner and Wes Streeting are acknowledged as evil genocide-complicit and supporting cnuts.Keir Starmer objects to criticism of the IDF. He asks how could anyone object to them starving people to death, forced marches like the Nazis did, bombing Gaza’s hospitals and universities, mass-murdering journalists, healthworkers and starving people queuing for food, killing and raping prisoners and murdering children. He calls for people to stop obstructing his genocide for Israel.Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpA
Israel has long been a racist and fascist state that seeks to dehumanise Palestinians in every possible way. The latest stark example of this reality was the gang rape crime committed by Israeli soldiers against a Palestinian detainee in the notorious Sde Teiman military prison. Yet, what shocked the Israeli government was not the horrific assault itself, but rather the fact that the footage documenting it was leaked to the media.
In the past week, the Israeli government and military establishment have been preoccupied with blaming Major-General Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, the Israeli army’s top military prosecutor, for being behind the leaked video—eventually pushing her to resign on Friday amid calls from several Israeli politicians to hold her accountable for the leak. She is also expected to face further questioning in the coming days. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu himself declared that the leak had harmed Israel’s image, describing it as the most “severe public relations attack” on Israel.
This reveals that Israel’s outrage was not over the gang rape crime itself, nor did it carry out a credible or genuine investigation to hold the perpetrators accountable. Rather, the regime’s main concern has been to discover how the footage of such a ruthless and inhumane act found its way to the public.
The leaked footage dates back to August 2024, during Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza. It shows Israeli soldiers grabbing and leading away a blindfolded Palestinian prisoner before surrounding him with riot shields to obscure the rape. The crime sparked a backlash, highlighting Israel’s brutal treatment of Palestinian prisoners, especially those arrested from Gaza during its genocidal war. Since October 2023, more than 80 Palestinian detainees have been killed in Israeli jails due to torture, abuse, and medical negligence.
In response to the leaked video, Israel announced it would conduct an investigation and detain the suspect soldiers. However, this move was nothing more than a charade – a familiar attempt to appease international outrage while ensuring that no real accountability is achieved. Not a single Israeli soldier or settler has ever faced genuine punishment for crimes against Palestinians. In fact, incidents like this only reaffirm that such assaults and abuses are systematic and often encouraged by top Israeli leadership.
Israel’s so-called justice system has long been an instrument of deception; a façade meant to convince the world that there is a functioning rule of law, but in reality, it exists to protect the occupation and those who enforce it.
The case of Shireen Abu Akleh, the Palestinian-American journalist working for Al Jazeera, is a powerful example. She was shot and killed on 11 May 2022 while covering an Israeli military raid in Jenin in the occupied West Bank. Under international pressure, Israel conducted an internal investigation that concluded the killing was “accidental” and that no criminal charges would be filed. This contradicted multiple independent journalistic investigations, which confirmed that Abu Akleh was deliberately targeted, despite wearing clear press markings.
Another case is that of Ayşenur Ezgi Eygi, a Turkish-American activist who was shot in the head in September 2024 while participating in a peaceful protest against Israeli settlements near Nablus. The Israeli military later admitted it was “highly likely” that its forces had fired the shot but described it as “indirect and unintentional.” Again, no one was held accountable.
These examples, among many others, demonstrate that Israel’s investigations into crimes against Palestinians, activists, and journalists are nothing but sham proceedings, a calculated performance to deceive global public opinion into believing there is justice in Israel. In truth, the Israeli judiciary is a political tool for maintaining the occupation and shielding its enforcers.
The Sde Teiman gang rape and the controversy over the leaked video are further evidence of the moral bankruptcy of the Israeli system, in particular its justice system. The crime and its cover-up show that the regime’s priorities are not justice, humanity, or accountability, but rather the preservation of its image and the protection of its soldiers even if they commit crimes. To the regime, the true crime was not the rape itself but the exposure of its cruelty, the tearing down of the carefully maintained façade of “Israeli democracy” and “rule of law.”
For decades, Palestinians have endured a pattern of Israeli brutality met with international silence. The complicity of Western governments and the shameful inaction of the international community have been central to this cycle. By providing unwavering diplomatic cover and blocking accountability at forums like the UN Security Council – the US administration has used its veto power at least three times in favor of Israel since October 2023; these powers have sent a clear message: Israel’s crimes carry no consequence.
The outrage in Israel over the Sde Teiman leak reveals the regime’s deepest fear: exposure. It fears the world seeing beyond its propaganda and witnessing the raw, unfiltered truth of its occupation. In this twisted system, the villain is Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, accused of leaking the video, not the soldiers who committed the gang rape. As for justice for the Palestinian victim, such a notion does not exist under Israel’s shambolic, biased, and complicit justice system.
The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.
This work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpAKeir Starmer objects to criticism of the IDF. He asks how could anyone object to them starving people to death, forced marches like the Nazis did, bombing Gaza’s hospitals and universities, mass-murdering journalists, healthworkers and starving people queuing for food, killing and raping prisoners and murdering children. He calls for people to stop obstructing his genocide for Israel.Orcas discuss Genocide-supporting and complicit Zionists. Donald Trump, Keith Starmer, David Lammy, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner and Wes Streeting are acknowledged as evil genocide-complicit and supporting cnuts.
Yahya Eid mourns over the body of his 10-year-old nephew, Shabaan Eid, who was killed by an Israeli army strike on the Bureij camp, during his funeral at al-Awda Hospital in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip, October 29, 2025
“NOTHING is going to jeopardise” the ceasefire in Gaza, says US President Donald Trump.
Western politicians’ language when addressing the Israel-Palestine “conflict” — a conflict provoked entirely by Israel’s illegal and murderous occupation and colonisation of Palestinian land — regularly upends reality, but here Trump takes the biscuit.
Of course “nothing will jeopardise” a ceasefire if you can claim it is holding while one side kills 104 people, including 46 children, in overnight air raids.
In fact Israel has repeatedly violated the ceasefire since it took effect on October 10, both by direct attacks on Palestinians (Tuesday night’s raids bring the number killed by Israeli action in Gaza since the fighting has officially stopped to 211) and by allowing access only to a fraction of the promised humanitarian assistance.
It has refused to reopen the Rafah crossing (itself a violation) and continues to severely restrict the number of aid lorries, though the people of Gaza face famine as a result of its blockade, and a chronic shortage of medicines and medical equipment — when not only are hundreds of thousands seriously injured, but disease is spreading at what the World Health Organisation calls a “catastrophic” rate because of the destruction of health and sanitation infrastructure.
Israel’s continued restrictions on bringing machinery into Gaza are also partly responsible for the violations it blames on Hamas, since the Palestinian group points out that retrieving the bodies of deceased hostages from beneath the rubble of buildings or tunnels destroyed by Israeli bombs is a slow and complicated process.
It is this issue which prompted Israel’s resumption of bombing in a blitz rivalling the most murderous nights of its two-year invasion. Forensic analysts say human remains handed over by Hamas did not come from one of 13 hostages whose bodies are still to be returned, but from one whose body was retrieved by the Israeli military nearly two years ago.
Whether Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would have reacted quite so explosively if announcing a national emergency hadn’t conveniently cut short a hearing in his own ongoing corruption trial, we don’t know. But his decision to treat Hamas’s return, whether wittingly or not, of the wrong person’s remains as an outrageous breach of the truce has cost 104 people their lives.
As UN special rapporteur Dr Francesca Albanese puts it, Israel’s approach to a ceasefire is “you cease, I fire.”
Keir Starmer objects to criticism of the IDF. He asks how could anyone object to them starving people to death, forced marches like the Nazis did, bombing Gaza’s hospitals and universities, mass-murdering journalists, healthworkers and starving people queuing for food, killing and raping prisoners and murdering children. He calls for people to stop obstructing his genocide for Israel.Orcas discuss Genocide-supporting and complicit Zionists. Donald Trump, Keith Starmer, David Lammy, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner and Wes Streeting are acknowledged as evil genocide-complicit and supporting cnuts.Vote Labour for Genocide.
Yahya Eid mourns over the body of his 10-year-old nephew, Shabaan Eid, who was killed by an Israeli army strike on the Bureij camp, during his funeral at al-Awda Hospital in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip, October 29, 2025