Avichai Mandelblit had no idea he was such a saboteur.

As chief military advocate general, he legalized government actions verging on war crimes. As Cabinet secretary, he signed dozens of documents advancing Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory. As attorney general, the job he currently holds, he exempted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from an investigation under caution in a scandal involving the purchase of submarines and other naval craft from Germany. Since last November, however, when Mandelblit announced his decision to indict Netanyahu on corruption charges, he has become the regime’s punching bag. At the Feb. 9 Cabinet meeting, ministers vied with each other over who could hit Mandelblit the hardest. They accused him of torpedoing the work of the government and undermining every initiative it seeks to undertake.

When Likud's Moshe Kahlon served as communications minister and pushed through a sweeping (and popular) reform of the mobile phone market, Netanyahu urged his ministers, “Be Kahlons.” (In light of the titillating correspondence that has recently come to light about Kahlon’s role in the appointment of Eti Kreif as a Shalom Court judge, Netanyahu may not be too keen to remember that exhortation.) These days, the ministers all want to be “Ohanas.”

Championed by the prime minister, Justice Minister Amir Ohana has turned Mandelblit and the state prosecutor into enemies of the people. As the March 2 elections draw near, the red lines defining the rule of law are being erased. Any time poll results darken the mood at the prime minister’s residence on Balfour Street in Jerusalem, it's a bad time for the attorney general and the state prosecutor on the other side of town on Salah a-Din Street.