Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit published Feb. 27 his decision to indict Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu "upon a hearing." However, since then, no date has been set for the hearing procedure. In fact, in legal parlance, and when it comes to Netanyahu, the term “hearing” seems synonymous with foot-dragging. As a first step, the Ministry of Justice had notified Netanyahu’s attorneys that the police and prosecution documents relating to his three pending indictments is ready to be picked up. But while this article is being penned, the ministry still chases after the attorneys, begging them to get the files. One can assume that when and if they pick up the documents, they will need several months “to study it.” Then, the attorney general and his team will analyze the lawyers’ comments and meet with them. That also takes time, and before you know it, a year has gone by.
In diplomatic jargon, this type of stalling is called “voicing reservations.” A very familiar term when talking about the Israeli-Palestinian "peace process." The archives of “the peace process” contain Israeli reservations to President Bill Clinton’s proposed peace plan from 2000 and to President George W. Bush’s 2003 road map for Middle East peace. Peace did not emerge from any of these reservations. Israel’s settlements in the occupied territories, on the other hand, have thrived.