️🇮🇱. Flash: An Israeli N12 investigation claimed that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office helped orchestrate the election day arrests of three Arab political activists to fuel claims that Arabs are stealing the election, according to the Jerusalem Post and Ynet.
️ According to reports, Netanyahu's Chief of Staff, Ido Norden, called the police the day before the elections and referred them to an alleged intelligence agency - a former employee in the Prime Minister's Office close to former CEO Yossi Shelli. The information he provided led to warrantless raids and arrests on election day, and later turned out to be unfounded. The investigators are checking whether the intelligence was planted on purpose.
️ The report also says that Shin Bet chief David Zini asked to listen to five Arab lawmakers on suspicion of foreign interference in the elections, but the Attorney General blocked the request. According to reports, Zini told opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot two days after the vote that he had evidence from 2018 of Arabs "stealing elections" that previous Shin Bet chiefs had ignored.
️ Netanyahu repeatedly amplified the news about the arrests during election day, and his office dismissed the report as "false" and "ground for defamation", and insisted that Norden only connected a source with criminal information to the police.