Israelis awoke Feb. 7 to an earthquake. According to an expose in the financial daily Calcalist, police had hacked the phones of unsuspecting Israeli citizens without a court order, using spyware developed against the country’s enemies. The list of those allegedly hacked was long and varied, including mayors, directors of government ministries, social activists, journalists and others. Among those mentioned were several close associates of former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, including key figures in his ongoing corruption trial.

The report, if true, is shocking in its civil rights implications. The alleged targeting of Netanyahu associates amplifies its destructive potential, fueling claims by the former prime minister and his allies that the investigation and prosecution against him on charges of bribery, fraud and breach of trust had all been rigged.

The resulting outcry over the revelations, which initially surfaced three weeks ago but with little detail, is compounded by broad public mistrust of the state institutions authorized to probe such allegations and get to the truth, giving further credence to claims by Netanyahu and his supporters of a political persecution designed to unseat a popular elected prime minister.

The latest reporting fuels the anarchy that Netanyahu has been spreading in recent years through his fans on social media, casting doubt on every law enforcement and legal institution, although no proof has come to light suggesting that information gleaned by the spyware planted in his associates’ cellphones had been used in his prosecution. For now, it is unclear what made the police allegedly “infect” the phones of those named in the Calcalist report, including the phone of Avner Netanyahu, the quieter and more modest of the two Netanyahu sons. But even without proof, the report has become as effective as the Israeli Pegasus software that has gained international notoriety in recent years for its use by unscrupulous regimes against their civilians.