OCCUPIED JERUSALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, on trial facing corruption charges, announced Sunday he had submitted a pardon request, saying the long-running cases were tearing the country apart.
US President Donald Trump wrote to Israeli President Isaac Herzog earlier this month, asking him to pardon Netanyahu, who has repeatedly denied wrongdoing in the ongoing court cases.
“The trial in my case has been ongoing for nearly six years, and is expected to continue for many more years,” Netanyahu said in a video statement.
He said he wanted to see through the process until acquittal, “but the security and political reality — the national interest — dictate otherwise. The State of Israel is facing enormous challenges”.
“The continuation of the trial is tearing us apart from within, arousing fierce divisions, intensifying rifts,” he added.
The cases against Netanyahu have exposed divisions in Israeli society between his supporters and opponents.
Netanyahu’s backers have dismissed the trials as politically motivated.
The premier and his wife Sara are accused in one case of accepting more than $260,000 worth of luxury goods such as cigars, jewellery and champagne from billionaires in exchange for political favours.
He is also accused of attempting to negotiate more favourable coverage from two Israeli media outlets in two other cases.
Netanyahu said the demand for him to testify on a thrice-weekly basis had “tipped the scales”.
“Three times a week is an impossible requirement,” he said.
“I am certain, like many others in the nation, that an immediate end to the trial will greatly help to lower the flames and promote the broad reconciliation that our country so desperately needs.”