A former employee of the Prime Minister’s Office with close ties to its former director-general, Yossi Shelley, provided the incriminating information that triggered the arrest of three Ra’am party activists on October 27, 2026, according to an investigative report broadcast by Channel 12’s investigative program Uvda.
The revelations have sparked intense political fallout and prompted Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara’s office and the police investigations division to examine whether the information was planted in advance to bolster the complaints and trigger arrests on Election Day.
Chief of Staff Contacted Police Prior to Election
Police entered the information into intelligence systems that same evening.
According to footage obtained by Channel 12, the wife of one detainee can be heard demanding search and arrest warrants, neither of which the police provided or had obtained.
During his arraignment at the Beersheba Magistrate’s Court, Abu Riyash’s defense attorney, Ali Abu Laban, requested the warrants and original sources, which police admitted had originated from an unnamed political source. The presiding judge ordered Abu Riyash’s release despite police claims that they had gathered much evidence during the raid.
One of those detained was Dr. Sayaf Abu Riyash, a physician from Rahat. Police prevented him from voting on Election Day, and he spent six days in custody before a court ordered his release after investigators found no basis for the claims.
Shin Bet Director Requested Wiretaps of Arab Knesset Members
The Channel 12 report also revealed that Shin Bet Director David Zini asked on Election Day to wiretap five Arab members of Knesset as part of the agency’s investigation into suspected foreign interference in the October 27 election.
Even though no proof existed against them, Zini also sought permission to interrogate outgoing Hadash chairman Ayman Odeh, Joint List member Ahmad Tibi, and United Arab List chairman Mansour Abbas under caution. Central Elections Committee chairman Justice Noam Sohlberg said that suspicions of foreign interference do not undermine the election’s integrity.
“There is information here going back to 2018 that the Arabs are stealing the elections in Israel. All the Shin Bet chiefs ignored it. I came, and I lifted that stone,” Zini told Eisenkot, according to i24NEWS.
The broadcast indicated that Zini fabricated these assertions to justify the activists’ arrests, failing all the while to substantiate them.
Prime Minister's Office Denies Report as Gadi Eisenkot Warns of Threats to Democracy
The Prime Minister’s Office issued a response calling the report a “grave attempt to silence the scandal regarding the subversion of the election process.”
Gadi Eisenkot cited the report as evidence that “Netanyahu and his inner circle posed a tangible, direct, and immediate threat to Israeli democracy,” adding that “there is no aspect of life in Israel that has not been corrupted, distorted, or subverted for the sake of Netanyahu’s personal political survival.” He warned that under a Netanyahu premiership, “fair and proper elections can no longer take place in Israel.”
Joint List member Yousef Jabareen argued that the findings raise “serious suspicions that Netanyahu attempted a coup by criminally using the police against the Arab public and its leaders,” adding that “this is conduct characteristic of repressive regimes,” and calling on Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara to investigate the matter. The Movement for Quality Government also called for an investigation into the Shin Bet’s conduct during the election.
The Shin Bet stated in response that as part of its legally mandated duties, the service carries out various actions in accordance with its legal authority, noting that publications regarding the targets of the investigation or the tools used in it are not on behalf of the agency and should be treated accordingly.
