Kadima MK and former minister Tzahi Hanegbi believes that making political appointments is a "normative practice" long employed by Israeli ministers and one for which he should not be prosecuted.

"The indictment [against me] is baseless," Hanegbi says in an interview that appears in this week's Haaretz magazine.

"For years, ministers have been involved in political appointments in their ministries. It's been a normative matter since the establishment of the state. This phenomenon of ministers involved in their office affairs was never reprimanded by any law enforcement system."

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The charge sheet against Hanegbi includes fraud, election bribery, perjury, and no less than 69 political appointments during his tenure at the Environment Ministry, among them his associates at the Likud Central Committee.

Hanegbi's trial will start on October 17 at the Jerusalem Magistrate Court. His attorneys have requested Hanegbi stand trial before a three-judge panel, due to the "expected consequences of the judges' verdict."

The request was approved.

Hanegbi says that he simply passed on resumes of applicants to civil servants when vacancies arose, including those of party members.

"When the professional levels asked for candidates for specific positions, we found candidates and sent their resumes. What I found worked, as did my predecessors, was to include the resumes of candidates who applied to my office - who to answer your question were Likud members - because they were the people who applied."

Hanegbi maintains that political appointments were common and he has received support from colleagues who were familiar with the practice.

"Fuad [Benjamin] Ben-Eliezer stopped me in the Knesset a few weeks ago, gave me a powerful slap on the back, and said to me, 'Tzahi Hanegbi, I don't understand why they are doing this to you. When the probe started, I said to Arik Sharon, that he and I should be killed, not investigated, for what we have been doing in our ministries all these years'."

The former minister also criticized top government officials for the way they have dealt with the situation in Lebanon for the six years since the withdrawal in May 2000.

"I don't recall any [Knesset] debate that discussed the significance of Israel's policy of restraint on the northern border. What the leadership doesn't understand, or doesn't want to, is that Israel hasn't won a war since 1967. Some we lost, and others ended with no clear verdict."