The contents of the Israeli state comptroller’s report on alleged illicit gifts and conflicts of interest — the so-called Bibi Tours affair — should not come as a surprise. Examining the funding of trips abroad by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his family between 2003 and 2005, when he served as head of the opposition and later as finance minister, the report paints a picture of the same hedonistic, shameless and exploitive Netanyahu who had proudly marched into the prime minister's residence on Jerusalem’s Balfour Street 20 years ago, in 1996. It is also the same Sara Netanyahu who even then had already assumed the mannerisms of royalty at the expense of the public coffers.
What should most concern every Israeli and anyone else who fears for the character of the state, if not for its fate, are not new revelations about corruption by elected officials. Their primary source of concern should be Israel’s steady climb in the corruption index along with its decline in the shame index. The second source is the degradation of its checks and balances, i.e., attorneys general and state comptrollers who drag their feet in rooting out suspected corruption.
