 |
|
|
Israeli
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has denied reports that his wife, Sara, stole
thousands of dollars’ worth of state funds from bottles returned to local
supermarkets on her orders.
RT.com reports that in
a Facebook post, Netanyahu railed against the “false accusations against me and my wife that seek to topple
the Likud and bring the left to power.”
Netanyahu
criticized local media who jumped at the opportunity to ridicule Sara, just a
month-and-a-half ahead of scheduled snap elections which will pit Netanyahu’s
ruling Likud party against a united center-left front.
"All
of this aims to detract attention from what is really important – who will lead
the country," he wrote.
But
Israeli media did seize the chance to make fun of Sara. A frequent target for
left-leaning Haaretz, she is often portrayed as out of touch and extravagant.
In
the wake of the revelation, Haaretz published a cartoon of her seated in her
living room, watching the recent spat between Israel and Hezbollah on
television, surrounded by empty bottles and ordering her staff to take the
bottles to the supermarket.
In
2013, the Netanyahu couple returned US$1,000 from used bottles to the state,
according to a spokesperson for the prime minister’s office. However, Meni
Naftali, a former manager for the prime minister’s residence, alleges in a
lawsuit for wrongful treatment that the actual sum was much higher.
He
claims that Sara made around US$6,000 over the course of four years during her
husband’s first term in office.
“She
would collect the bottles obsessively,” Naftali told Yedioth
Ahronoth daily, in an interview published on Friday. "'Here’s a bottle, here’s another
bottle.'"
Haaretz reported that the
matter has been turned over to the Attorney General’s Office.
No comments:
Post a Comment