''Hapel' celebrates: Charges dropped against 'Hapel' leaders accused of extortion

February 20, 2023   

The story of the arrest of dozens of members of the Jerusalem Faction and the indictments filed against senior figures from the newspaper "Hapels" came to an end with the decision of the prosecutor's office to withdraw the indictments. This was reported this evening (Monday) by Netael Bendel in "Israel Hayom". According to the report, the indictment in which the defendants were accused of blackmailing and threatening senior figures in the economy was canceled even before the evidentiary hearings in the case began. The Tel Aviv District Prosecutor's Office informed the court today that it had decided to cancel the indictment against the three senior figures from "Hapels" - Natan Grossman, Shmuel Elyashiv and Avraham Trigger. The prosecutor's announcement is the result of a mediation process held between the prosecutor's office and the defense attorneys, attorneys Ravit Tzemach and Amit Nir who represented Grossman, Dotan Danieli who represented Elyashiv and Malki Blitenthal who represented Trigger. The mediation was conducted by Judge Ronit Poznansky Katz. The facts detailed in the indictment state that in February 2014, a letter signed by Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky and Rabbi Steinman was published in the competing newspaper "Yated Ne'eman" and in other media outlets, calling on their followers to boycott the newspaper: "Do not assist the Hapeles newspaper in any way, including not being interviewed or advertising in the Hapeles newspaper, and that it is appropriate to inform advertisers in this newspaper that they may be aiding in the desecration of the name of God." Following this call, Grossman, Elyashiv and Trigger conspired to blackmail executives at large companies in the economy, including Osem, Strauss, Egged and Sano, with the intention of causing the companies to advertise in the newspaper "Hapeles" and not in the competing newspaper "Yated Ne'eman." To this end, Trigger conspired with other defendants with the aim of threatening the complainants and harassing them in various media outlets in a way that would disrupt and damage their daily lives and work. In this framework, they operated telephone lines that served as a focal point for the struggle against the call of the rabbis, in which the defendants, among other things, provided the names of the companies that should be harassed and the telephone numbers of their office holders. During the months of October 2015 - April 2017, on numerous occasions, tens of thousands of Hasidim obeyed the line of struggle and the content that was presented in it and as a result, called the complainants at unusual hours and with great frequency and harassed them by telephone. As a result of the harassment, the complainants suffered direct and indirect damage to their private and business lives. They stopped answering the phones en masse, some of them stopped advertising their products in the Haredi press, and their profits were thus harmed. Now, as mentioned, the Prosecutor's Office has decided to drop the indictments.