Key figure in Netanyahu bribery trial was spied on: Israeli media
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Schlomo Filber's phone was tapped by Israeli police.
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Netanyahu... not so happy (Reuters)
"Israel" does not fail to impress in its spyware scandals.
Reports that police may have used spyware in Netanyahu's trial have fluttered around on Israeli media, as scandals arise on the use of Israeli spyware around the globe.
Netanyahu described what is happening as an "earthquake", as police were heard discussing tapping a phone belonging to a Netanyahu ally, Schlomo Filber.
As an Israeli police officer is heard saying, "It's as if it's illegal," he continued to "install the application."
The recordings which emerged and created a national scandal were not addressed by the police, as they declined to comment.
However, a spokesperson claimed that the "Israeli police will cooperate fully and transparently," which wouldn't be so likely considering that not much accountability was held when NSO's Pegasus emerged and created an international uproar.
Read more: Pegasus' nemesis: Meet QuaDream, another Israeli spyware company
Netanyahu's lawyers demanded the court to "order the prosecutor to reveal all the elements of the probe obtained through Pegasus or other spyware," according to a statement.
Netanyahu is being tried on charges of bribery, fraud, and breach of trust.
The "earthquake"
Schlomo Filber has been accused of mediating between Netanyahu and a shareholder for Bezeq, a telecommunications company, to exchange favors for positive news coverage on a news site owned by the firm.
An expert on technology and law at the "Israel Democracy Institute" explained how this event could depict why Netanyahu's closest advisors turned against him. "Maybe one of the investigators found something on Filber's phone that helped the police influence or convince Filber to become a witness against Netanyahu," she said.
MBS called Netanyahu to renew KSA's NSO Pegasus spyware license
A vicious cycle: Netanyahu's outrage is none but a follow-up from his "country's" espionage on world leaders, activists, and politicians.
"You can't really use a technology or a product like Pegasus as Israel's gift of friendship to all the dictatorships in Africa, and to Hungary and India and Mexico on the one hand, and then on the other hand complain when it is used in Israel," said Shwartz Altshuler, a tech and law expert at the Institute.
In a recent report by the New York Times, Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman called former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu directly to request a renewal of the Kingdom's expired license of NSO Group's Pegasus spyware in exchange for opening its airspace to Israeli flights.
The Israeli Security Ministry refused to renew Riyadh's license for the program after it expired, citing "Saudi Arabia's abuse of NSO's spyware," presumably referring to the case of Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi journalist who was reportedly spied using Pegasus in the lead up to his assassination in 2018.
Read more: Bin Salman’s “Cyberweapon”: Not Only Against Saudis
NSO was unable to supply Saudi Arabia with routine software maintenance due to the lack of an Israeli export license, the report said, adding that its systems were crashing. NYT reported that numerous calls between the Crown Prince's aides, NSO executives, the Mossad, and the Israeli Security Ministry had failed to address the matter.
According to Israeli sources familiar with the call, the Crown Prince then made an urgent direct phone call to Netanyahu, requesting that the license be renewed. This call occurred before the normalization agreements between the Israeli occupation, UAE, and Bahrain were signed in 2020.
For the first time ever, Israeli jets heading eastward on their route to the Gulf were allowed to use Saudi airspace as part of the arrangements.
According to the source, Netanyahu, who was uninformed of the license problems until his conversation with the Crown Prince, promptly instructed the Israeli Security Ministry to remedy the matter.
The same night, a ministry official called NSO's operations office and requested that the Saudi systems be turned back on.
