Jerusalem Post editor-in-chief Zvika Klein is suspected of having been part of a “mechanism” to advance Qatar’s interests in exchange for benefit from Doha, Israeli legal authorities announced on Thursday.
Attorney-General Gali Baharav Miara and State Attorney Amit Aisman said Klein was interrogated under caution in Israel’s “Qatargate” affair due to admissions he made in open testimony which they said linked him to efforts to improve Qatar’s image in Israel in return for benefit.
“The journalist who was questioned under caution in the framework of the affair was originally summoned to give open testimony and not as a suspect,” the two officials said in a statement to the press on Thursday.
“In the framework of his testimony, a significant suspicion was formed that the journalist was, together with the prime minister’s aides, part of the mechanism of receiving benefits from Qatar,” added the statement.
The Israel Police’s Lahav 433 National Unit for International Crimes, working with the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet), moved to arrest Klein on Monday alongside Yonatan Urich and Eli Feldstein, current and former aides, respectively, to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The Qatar probe was launched in response to allegations that Feldstein, while employed as a spokesman on military affairs for the prime minister, also worked for a firm seeking to boost Doha’s image.
Urich and Feldstein are reportedly both suspected of contact with a foreign agent, money laundering, bribery, fraud and breach of trust.
In February, Israel’s Channel 13 News reported that Feldstein had arranged a visit to Qatar for Klein, who published a series of articles about the trip in 2024 in which he described meetings with Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani and other officials.
In remarks cited by Hebrew media outlets on Thursday, anonymous sources close to the journalist claimed that Klein “has never received any benefit or anything else from Qatar or any of its representatives.”
Klein was reportedly released from house arrest without restrictions on Thursday.
Qatar, which has hosted Hamas’s leadership and has provided the organization with hundreds of millions of dollars, played a role in mediating the freedom of hostages held by the terrorist group.
Doha has deflected accusations of playing a double game, saying that the United States requested that it open the mediation channel with Hamas.
Netanyahu, who testified to police in the affair on Monday evening, has denounced the Qatar probe, dubbed “Qatargate” by Israeli media, a “political witch-hunt” aimed at bringing down his government by targeting staff of the Prime Minister’s Office.
The Israeli premier was summoned to provide open testimony, and has not been questioned under caution as part of the Qatar investigation.