{"id":838753,"date":"2026-11-05T04:20:00","date_gmt":"2026-11-05T09:20:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/?p=838753"},"modified":"2026-11-05T03:50:22","modified_gmt":"2026-11-05T08:50:22","slug":"israel-certifies-election-results-as-shin-bet-chief-and-attorney-general-trade-accusations-over-questioning-arab-lawmakers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/838753","title":{"rendered":"Israel certifies election results as Shin Bet chief and attorney general trade accusations over questioning Arab lawmakers"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A graphic broadcast by i24NEWS on November 4, 2026 showing what the channel reported was a heated exchange between Shin Bet chief David Zini and Attorney General Gali Baharav Miara over questioning lawmakers. Graphic: i24NEWS, shared on X by @Wq0oQJmUSfZunt5 via X<\/em><\/p>\n

Israel’s Central Elections Committee certified the results of the October 27 vote on Wednesday, while the Shin Bet chief and the attorney general traded accusations over his request to question four Arab politicians.<\/p>\n

The committee’s plenary approved the results by 15 votes to 2, with 14 abstentions, most of them from parties in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s bloc, The Jerusalem Post and Channel 14 reported. The committee said its review found no irregularities showing that the integrity of the election had been harmed or that the outcome would change. The committee’s official count gives Netanyahu’s coalition parties 53 seats, the opposition bloc 48 and Arab parties a record 19, leaving neither camp with the 61 seats needed for a majority.<\/p>\n

The certification went ahead under a cloud. Last week the committee’s chairman, Supreme Court Justice Noam Sohlberg, asked the Shin Bet to look into suspected foreign funding of the vote, as Mereja Media reported. This week the Shin Bet’s director, David Zini, a Netanyahu appointee, asked to question Ra’am leader Mansour Abbas, Ta’al leader Ahmad Tibi, Balad leader Sami Abu Shehadeh and a fourth senior Joint List lawmaker whose name is barred from publication, The Times of Israel reported, citing i24NEWS.<\/p>\n

Attorney General Gali Baharav Miara refused. Her office said in an unusually public statement on Tuesday that “it is not possible to interrogate citizens or elected officials without evidence that justifies it,” and that the Shin Bet had failed to hand over the material it had collected to a joint investigative team, “thereby effectively delaying the handling of the matter.” According to the reports, the Shin Bet had provided evidence only about the fourth lawmaker. A Joint List spokesperson told The Jerusalem Post that former Joint List leader Ayman Odeh is among the lawmakers suspected of receiving foreign money.<\/p>\n

The reported exchange between the two officials became public in unusual detail. On Wednesday evening, i24NEWS correspondent Avishai Greenzaig aired what he described as a transcript of a shouting match between them, which spread on X in Hebrew. “Let me investigate the Knesset members,” Zini told the attorney general, according to the report. She answered that without reasonable suspicion she would not allow anyone, and especially a lawmaker, to be questioned under caution. Zini replied that she had approved Shin Bet investigations on weaker suspicion, and she said there had to be reasonable suspicion.<\/p>\n

Netanyahu’s camp accuses her of protecting suspects. National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir demanded that she be removed from the probe and that Zini lead it, saying in a video shared on X: “They stole the elections here! The people of Israel do not accept the theft of the elections!” Likud’s David Peter told Kol Chai radio that her instruction was illegal and amounted to obstruction, and that Zini should fight it at the High Court of Justice. Likud lawmaker Amit Halevi resigned from the elections committee to protest the certification, Channel 14 reported.<\/p>\n

The Arab politicians named in the reports have called the probe politicized. Tibi answered with a joke that was widely shared: “Zini is investigating suspicions of a connection between the Joint List and the Democrats in the U.S.,” he said, adding that the same method was used in both cases, in which people “turned out in droves at polling stations, cast their ballots and went home.”<\/p>\n

Not every voice in Israel picked a side. Amit Segal, chief political analyst at Channel 12 News, wrote on X that the committee and the Shin Bet were answering different questions: the committee found no evidence of ballot fraud, while Zini’s claim is about large sums of foreign money. He wrote that he has almost no trust in the attorney general, that Zini had also made serious mistakes, and that the case should stay with Justice Sohlberg because he is “the one official both camps can’t dismiss as partisan.” Channel 14 reported that the head of the police’s major crimes unit, Boaz Blat, had said after meeting Zini that the suspicions were “not at a significant level.”<\/p>\n

The practical next step is a meeting. Elinor Shirkani Kofman, legal correspondent for Israel Hayom, reported on X that Shin Bet and police representatives were due to meet on Thursday to start the joint investigation, because no material had yet been handed to the police despite Sohlberg’s decision to form a joint team. Ynet reported that police had no plan for now to summon any lawmaker, including Odeh, and quoted a police source as saying, “We are waiting for the Shin Bet.” Zini and Baharav Miara also met on Wednesday in what Hebrew media described as a lengthy attempt to lower tensions, and Zini agreed to hand over all relevant evidence to her office and follow her instructions, Channel 13 reported, according to The Times of Israel.<\/p>\n

The certified results have been submitted to President Isaac Herzog, the Hebrew news account HaHadashot HaHadashot (@thenewnews_isr) reported, and Herzog must now consult the parties before asking a lawmaker to try to form a government, a process that the fight over the Shin Bet probe now hangs over.<\/p>\n

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