Two of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s closest associates, his personal diplomatic envoy Yitzhak Molcho and his family lawyer David Shimron, were detained this week in the context of an investigation into the Israeli purchase of German submarines suspected to have involved bribery. 

“One has to be really gullible to believe that brothers-in-law Shimron and Molcho, business partners who occupy adjacent offices, don’t know what each other is up to,” Michael Ben-Yair, who was attorney general under Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, wrote this week on Facebook. “One has to be really gullible to believe that Netanyahu, a relative of Shimron [and by extension of Molcho] who pulls their strings like a puppeteer on various missions at his behest and on his behalf, knows nothing about the doings of these two, obviously at his behest and on his behalf.”

The monthly Peace Index published this week by the Israel Democracy Institute and the Evens Program in Mediation and Conflict Resolution at the University of Tel Aviv indicates that the Israeli public is not naive. indicates that the Israeli public is not naive. A firm majority (58% of the Jews surveyed and 68% of the Arabs) do not believe that the various criminal investigations into the prime minister and his close associates are designed to unseat him, as Netanyahu and his allies keep claiming. A clear majority believes the prime minister should not be immune from investigation if warranted: 66% of the Jews polled and 86% of the Arabs oppose the so-called “French law” proposal that would preclude probes of serving prime ministers unless they’re suspected of a particularly egregious offense.

A July poll published by Maariv also shows that only 30% of those surveyed believe the claims by Netanyahu and his associates that the prime minister was not involved in the so-called “submarine affair” — compared with 55% who disbelieve the denials. A majority does not buy Netanyahu’s claim that the investigations by the police and the state prosecutor are the result of efforts by political rivals to depose him. Half of Israelis believe Netanyahu is corrupt. As expected, his standing in stronger among members of the right and of religious parties.