Hours after he won his lawsuit claiming hostile work conditions created by the wife of the prime minister, Meni Naftali, the former house manager at the prime minister’s residence, called a press conference Feb. 10. What he said was no less important than the court’s verdict: “There are many more things I didn’t reveal. Very serious things that harmed the functioning [of the prime minister] … the prime minister knows about it all.”
The court’s reverberating verdict read in part, “The examination of the evidence presented before us shows a very grim picture of what occurs at the prime minister’s residence in all that relates to the conditions of employment, the work environment they are exposed to, their treatment and the safeguarding of their honor and their rights.” At the center of the verdict by Judge Dita Pruginin is Sara Netanyahu, who managed the workers at the Jerusalem residence. But the public debate should also focus on the responsibility of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the affair. Since the prime minister lives in the same house and is exposed to the behavior of his wife, he should also be seen as a partner to the humiliating treatment of workers — even if he didn’t yell at them or abuse them directly.
