The Pandora Papers, the 2.94 terabytes exposé unveiling the hidden wealth of the offshore world released by the ICIJ, implicated thousands of high-profile figures around the globe, including 565 Israelis.

Three elite Israelis have made waves when their names were dropped in the leaks, showcasing a deeply criminal financial underworld run in tandem with “Israel’s” official politics.

A former “Justice" Minister

Haim Ramon, the former Israeli “Justice" Minister, appeared in the papers in connection to a suspicious tourism real estate deal in Montenegro with Martin Schlaff, an Austrian casino magnate.

The allegations stem from a deal surrounding the “Bigova Bay” company set up in 2006: With a 20 million euro from an Austrian bank, the company began setting a tourism project in Montenegro by buying land in the area.

In 2008, the company was hit by the global financial crisis and was subsequently sold to a company owned by Schlaff in 2013.

Yet, the company had 52 million euros in debts by 2016 and Schlaff ultimately sold it to a Cypriot company partially owned by Ramon, before he became its sole owner. 

The multi-million dollar deal does not financially add up though, with the company ridden with large debts and not showing any promising sign of progress and a clause allowing Schlaff to buy back the company.

The Austrian businessman Martin Schlaff has a notorious reputation in Israeli political circles, and he became a black sheep after his connection to current finance Minister Avigdor Liberman was publicized in the latter’s trial. Liberman was acquitted, but it became clear he was taking large briberies from Schlaff.

Meanwhile, Ramon’s track record is far from stellar: Prior to the “Bigova Bay” deal, the former minister was previously dragged to courts and then officially convicted of sexual misconduct in 2007 after forcing a kiss on a young female soldier.

Refuting accusations of being "Schlaff's straw man," Ramon did not give much of a justification behind this ludicrous deal, as everything so far points out to a different direction, that of shady deals and financial malpractices.

Diamonds and bribes

The papers revealed that Israeli diamond magnate Beny Steinmetz and his children transferred $1 billion from a Lichtenstein-based fund to one in the Cook Islands.

Interestingly enough, Steinmetz has already been a target of multiple trials:

The first trial launched by Romania ended by sentencing the Israeli billionaire in absentia to five years in jail for organized crime, as he was found guilty of creating an “organized criminal group” in a real estate case that cost the Romanian state $145 million.

In the second trial, which took place in Geneva, he was convicted of bribery. Steinmetz had set up a large financial web, which constituted chiefly of front companies, to bribe different parties so that his company - Beny Steinmetz Group Resources (BSGR) - would obtain mining permits in Simandou, Guinea’s southeastern region. It is estimated to have the world’s largest untapped iron ore deposits.

Most fascinatingly, the billion-dollar transfer took place in 2018, at the height of the legal proceedings against him, thus displaying an extremely shady - and possibly illegal - approach to moving finances. 

The unethical mayor

One of the most striking names to appear amongst the list is Likud Member of Knesset Nir Barkat.

The prominent politician has holdings in eToro, a company registered in the Virgin Islands despite having the majority of its offices located in the Occupied Territories. Having a company registered in a tax haven violates the Knesset Ethics Committee’s guidelines.

Serving as mayor of occupied al-Quds between 2008 and 2018, Barkat was supposed to have maintained his wealth under blind trust in order to avoid a conflict of interests. Yet, the leaked data showed that most of his fortune remained under his name until 2019.

After becoming an MK in 2019, the former mayor transferred his shares to his brother Eli Barkat, despite the Knesset Ethics Committee’s guidelines demanding elected officials to transfer their funds to a “public trust company.”

The lawmaker was Benjamin Netanyahu’s favorite candidate for becoming the finance minister, had the disgraced former PM managed to form a government in his latest round.

With a net worth estimated at $139 million, Barkat is the wealthiest Israeli lawmaker and the current revelations shed some light on how he became so.

Israeli corruption running rampant

The audacity of Israeli officials such as Netanyahu and Liberman to walk in and out of the court, while surrounding themselves with corrupt figures such as Ramon, Steinmetz, and Barkat, highlights the shrewd nature of Israeli politics: The more corrupt you are, the higher of an asset you become to the Israeli government.

After all, someone has to pay for all those children-targeting missiles on Gaza.