Ari Harow, who served as Netanyahu\u2019s chief of staff from 2014-2015, was handed six months of community service and fined 700,000 shekels ($190,000) for convictions of fraud and breach of trust.<\/p>\n
The sentence by the Rishon Lezion Magistrate\u2019s Court is seen as a reward for Harow\u2019s cooperation in the high-stakes prosecution of Netanyahu, Israel\u2019s longest-serving prime minister who is charged with accepting bribes, fraud and breach of trust over his ties to wealthy associates.<\/p>\n
While working as Netanyahu\u2019s top aide, Harow admitted to orchestrating a \u201cfictitious sale\u201d of his small political consulting firm, 3H Global, in 2014 for an inflated $3 million sale price. The overvalued sale allowed Harow to bypass conflict-of-interest rules requiring him to divest business holdings while serving as chief of staff.<\/p>\n
Prosecutors say Harow transferred the $3 million in proceeds to a relative, then had the money returned after leaving the prime minister\u2019s office a year later.<\/p>\n
The 46-year-old Harow was among the first arrested in 2021 in the long-running investigations that led to Netanyahu\u2019s indictment. He subsequently struck a deal to turn state\u2019s witness against his former boss, providing key testimony about an allegedly illicit supply of luxury gifts that flowed between Netanyahu and two billionaire friends.<\/p>\n
Harow told prosecutors that Netanyahu was fully aware of the inflated payment Harow received through his company\u2019s \u201cfictitious\u201d sale. He also described a quid pro quo where Netanyahu allegedly used his position of power to assist the billionaires in exchange for luxury items like champagne and cigars.<\/p>\n
With Harow\u2019s testimony locked in, prosecutors appear determined to achieve a conviction despite Netanyahu\u2019s claims of innocence and repeated attempts to discredit the cases through delays and other legal maneuvering.<\/p>\n
The sentencing comes just weeks before Israelis head to the polls on November 1 for the fifth national election in under four years, with the allegations against Netanyahu a key issue. While he is fighting for his political life, the cases against him are expected to drag on for months or even years longer.<\/p>\n
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The sentence by the Rishon Lezion Magistrate\u2019s Court is seen as a reward for Harow\u2019s cooperation in the high-stakes prosecution of Netanyahu, Israel\u2019s longest-serving prime minister.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":406,"featured_media":16169,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[10185,327,316,9809,4421,9911],"class_list":["post-16166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-israel","tag-ari-harow","tag-benjamin-netanyahu","tag-israel","tag-israeli-prime-minister-benjamin-netanyahu","tag-netanyahu","tag-rishon-lezion"],"reading_time":"2 min read","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16166","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/406"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16166"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16166\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}