Last update - 02:30 14/02/2007
Katsav's hearing with Mazuz to take place in mid-April
By Yuval Yoaz and Gideon Alon
Attorney General Menachem Mazuz will apparently hold a hearing for President Moshe Katsav in about two months, between April 10 and April 15.
Katsav's attorneys, Zion Amir and Avigdor Feldman, are expected to tell Mazuz later this week that they need about six weeks to study the evidence and prepare their arguments for the hearing. The hearing would thus take place after the judicial system returns from its Passover break but before Holocaust Remembrance Day.
Mazuz is expected to agree to this time frame. The Justice Ministry previously indicated that Mazuz was ready to hold the hearing immediately, but it is clear that the president's legal team needs some preparation time.
Mazuz is expected to announce his final decision on whether or not to indict Katsav within two weeks after the hearing. If an indictment if forthcoming, the president will have to resign permanently, in accordance to his promise to the High Court of Justice, unless he has either quit or been forced out before then.
In the hearing, Katsav's lawyers will try to convince Mazuz that the evidence does not warrant an indictment at all, or at least not on the most serious charges - rape, sexual relations involving an abuse of power and sexual assault. They do not, however, intend to propose any type of plea bargain, since that would involve admitting to at least some of the sexual misconduct charges.
The Knesset House Committee will open impeachment proceedings against Katsav this morning, in accordance with the procedure it approved two weeks ago. Katsav's attorneys will also be there to present their arguments to the committee, even though on Monday, they told Committee Chair MK Ruhama Avraham that they did not intend to attend the first two sessions, today and next week.
"It is inconceivable," Amir and Feldman wrote to Avraham, "that even before the president is able to present his arguments to the attorney general, he should have to present his defense, including presenting evidence, witnesses, depositions and legal arguments, before the Israel Knesset, a body that does not have jurisdiction over the state's legal system. This is a scandalous and terrible kind of 'kangaroo court' that is liable to harm the president's rights as president and as a citizen. It is an act that is liable to be interpreted as frivolous, populist and beneath the Knesset's dignity."
Yesterday, however, Amir announced that he would attend the House Committee meeting.
Mazuz, on the other hand, said that he would be unable to provide the committee with any details about the suspicions against the president beyond the announcement he made last month regarding his intention to indict him, subject to the outcome of the April hearing. Mazuz emphasized that if invited by the committee, he would attend, but would not be able to contribute new information. The committee decided against inviting Mazuz to today's session, but will summon him later if necessary.
A source close to Katsav who has seen the draft indictment said that he was "surprised at the seriousness of the charges laid out in the indictment." He attributed the surprise, which he said was shared by other associates of the president who had seen the document, to the gap between what they had expected, based on what they knew about the case, and what the indictment actually included, as well as to the fact that the indictment's severity seemed to contradict the opinion of several government prosecutors involved in the case.
The House Committee deliberations are expected to take three to four weeks, after which a vote will be taken. Impeachment requires a 75 percent majority (19 of the panel's 25 MKs), which supporters of the move do not have at present.