(Hai Fe) - The Haifa Magistrate's Court dismissed the defamation lawsuit of city council member Yoav Ramati against attorney Lior Datz.
It all started in October 2018 after elections were held and Ramati's faction (The Jewish Home) joined the coalition and an agreement was signed between Kalish's faction and Ramati's faction under which Ramati will be appointed as the chairman of the Yaffe Nof board of directors. Ramati is an electrical engineer by profession and the owner of the Sapir company. During 2019, he conducted an audit The state is investigating the conflict of interest that Ramati, the chairman of the board of directors, is in, in light of his business ties through the Sapir company he owns.
Although the draft of the auditor's report was not matured or published, it was submitted for reference by the Haifa municipality, and as a result, the mayor held a meeting, following which the municipality's legal advisor, attorney Yamit Klein, applied to the committee for conflicts of interest of elected officials in the local authorities at the Ministry of Justice for a reference.
"Comprehensive and frequent conflict of interest"
In June 2020, the committee issued a comprehensive and detailed report and came to the conclusion that due to a comprehensive and frequent conflict of interest in which Ramati finds himself, he cannot serve as chairman of the Yaffe Nof board of directors or even as a board member, and that under the circumstances of the matter, it is not even possible to settle for a conflict of interest agreement.
From the report it emerged that Ramati maintains business relations with 27 suppliers of Yaffe Nof and according to the data provided by Attorney Klein, these suppliers are involved in 51 out of 216 projects and that these are the heavy and significant projects. The aforementioned suppliers are involved in 14 of the 16 projects that cost over 50 million shekels, and the cumulative execution budgets of the projects in which the aforementioned suppliers are involved add up to approximately 3.6 billion shekels in aggregate, out of a total amount of 4.1 billion shekels.
Despite what was stated in the conflict of interest committee report, Ramati continued to hold his position as chairman of the Yaffe Nof board of directors for more than a month, after the publication of the report, until in August 2020 he suspended himself from that position.
After his suspension, Ramati tried to change the evil of the decree. Therefore, the Yaffa Nof company and attorney Yamit Klein applied to the conflict of interest committee with a request to re-examine the findings of the report, citing a substantial change in circumstances. After a renewed examination, the Conflict of Interest Committee issued another report in October 2020, in which it stood by its assertions in the previous report and under the circumstances of the matter, and Ramati resigned from his position as chairman of the Yaffe Nof board of directors.
Ramati accused Motti Blitzblau of the Green Party of forgery
About two weeks after the publication of the conflict of interest committee's report, Ramati was interviewed on the radio show "Free Arena", in which the chairman of the Greens, Avihu Han, also participated. During the program, Ramati accused Moti Blitzblau of the Green Party, who is a member of Hifa Nof, of forgery and misleadingly issuing a summons to the gathering. Attorney Detz appeared on the program, as Blitzblau's attorney, and the presenter asked for his response to the allegation of forgery.
From Shala Adv. Detz, he responded to the program by saying, "Yoav Ramati is lying... not only is he lying. Yoav Ramati is a criminal, apparently... and on Sunday - both things will become clear. Unambiguously and clearly..."
As a result of what Attorney Detz said, Ramati filed a defamation lawsuit against him in the amount of 142,000 shekels.
Moti Blitzblau, for his part, also filed a defamation lawsuit against Ramati and won the lawsuit. Blitzblau was represented, as mentioned, by attorney Lior Datz:
The judge of the Haifa Magistrate's Court, Ramzi Hadid, stated in his decision that the question arises, is it not clear to anyone with eyes in his head that the application of Attorney Klein and Yaffe Nof to the Committee on Conflict of Interest with a request to re-examine its determinations in the report, alleging a substantial change in circumstances, Raises question marks in light of the fact that Ramati, he and no one else, dealt with the Ministry of Transportation in the decision to terminate the contract with Yaffe Nof in the framework of his position as chairman of the board of directors of Yaffe Nof. An application that was made, among other things, through Yaffe Nof's legal advisor and which as of that date Ramati Although he was suspended from his position as chairman of the board, he has not yet resigned from his position.
Judge Ramzi Hadid: "Discrepancies in Ramati's report to the Yaffe Nof board of directors"
The Honorable Judge Ramzi Hadid also noted that beyond the problematic fact that despite the findings of the report Ramati continued to manage Yaffe Nof's affairs in general, and vis-a-vis the Ministry of Transportation in particular, the gap between the Ministry of Transportation's intention and the matter of continuing the engagement with Yaffe Nof in the Matron project cannot be ignored , as well as the rest of the projects, with the exception of the port connection project, and the report that Ramati gave to the members of the company's board of directors on the subject.
After all, the Ministry of Transportation chose to leave the matron project in the hands of Yaffe Nof, and to examine the matter after six months. The Ministry of Transport also chose to examine the other projects, with the exception of the port connection project, individually. Between these and Ramati's report to the board members as if the Ministry of Transportation had decided to transfer all the projects in which it contracted with Yaffe Nof within a year, the gap is significant.
"The totality of the circumstances raises question marks regarding the very filing of the claim"
"I found reinforcement for the conclusion I reached in the trial in the fact that from the date of the publication of the subject of the lawsuit in July 2020 until Ramati addressed a warning letter to Attorney Detz in November 2020, about four months passed, no less. During the aforementioned period, the administrative petition was submitted and discussed, Ramati suspended himself from his position as chairman of the Yaffe Nof board of directors and later resigned from that position.
And also, Ramati did not contact the radio station with a request to download the program from the station's website. The above-mentioned set of circumstances raises questions regarding the very filing of the lawsuit as well as the damage caused to Ramati, as much as it was caused, by the publication. Therefore, I reject the lawsuit and order the plaintiff Ramati through his attorney to pay court costs in the amount of NIS 11,700," Judge Hadid concluded.
Attorney Lior Detz, message to Lahi Pa:
"Despite all his reservations, the Magistrate's Court found that there is a basis for the determination that there is a suspicion that Ramati committed a criminal offense of breach of trust. This is very serious, because for the first time there is a clear judicial determination here that Ramati acted in a serious conflict of interest that may amount to a breach of trust.
Attorney Detz added: This determination is even stronger than an administrative procedure, because it was determined after a long evidence procedure. The judge also determined that Ramati lied to the Yaffe Nof board of directors when he claimed that the Ministry of Transportation asked to take over all the projects while the situation was completely different.
Ramati and Klish are the ones who asked to take the entire project from Mipa Nof. Therefore, the judge severely criticized the fact that an appeal was made to the conflict of interest committee to reconsider the decision regarding Ramati in light of the fact that all the projects that moved from Mipa Nof.
We believe that the Israel Police cannot but open an investigation, after the court determined what it determined, but we highly doubt that the Israel Police will do its thing. Therefore, it is not surprising that Israel is ranked high in the global corruption ranking.
It is clear that Ramati, with the backing of Kalish, has caused enormous economic damage to the residents of Haifa, when he prefers his personal interests over the good of the city. I am very saddened by the fact that members of the Change Council, even though they knew who Ramati was, chose to join him, just to hurt Klish and thereby abandoned the interests of the city's residents and contributed to public corruption.
Now the residents of Haifa have to come into account with those elected officials Vermati himself. My partners and I - Attorney Uri Shila and Attorney Yossi Or HaCohen will not be afraid - neither of the private investigators of Kalish that she sent to us nor of silence claims."
City Council member Yoav Ramati told Lahi Pa:
"A lawyer on my behalf, from Avni & Co., is studying the verdict and we will consider our steps, after we study the verdict. I intend to continue my services for the public in light of the unprecedented achievements I have made over the past 5 years."
Is it a coincidence that we find behavior that supports bribery, fraud and breach of trust in religious Zionism?
Ignoring the serious details detailed in the article, it is necessary to examine, an in-depth examination, the conduct of the Haifa Municipality. For example, see the approval of the 'Ramat Gural' program - a procedure that took place under a heavy cloud of suspicions of a conflict of interest by some of those involved in its approval procedures, including the removal of at least 2 women who were involved in it, and it should be noted that the removal procedure for those who are concerned about a conflict of interest in their care is a difficult procedure which is accompanied by strong opposition on the part of the public authorities, who present themselves as 'representatives of the public interest' and who, as is suspected, whitewash the information, so that the procedures for the approval of an important outline content will determine the situation according to which no new neighborhood will be established and after a freeze of over 50 years will continue And even more so to prevent the realization of the construction. It should be noted that the problem of fear of a conflict of interest is not the only problem involved in approving the 'Ramat Goral' plan - which involves a colossal collapse of systems that produces severe transportation hazards affecting the entire city. To solve the problems, we need another 1,000 people like Lior Detz or simply a large public of citizens will decide that they are not ready to allow corruption to continue to dominate the lives of all of us and actions will be taken against corruption.
I am not involved in the matters of the suspicions of acts of corruption detailed in the article. There is an argument here that a police investigation is needed and this may be what is needed. In any case, the public systems in Israel are collapsing, in general, in everything related to the municipality of Haifa, see in this regard, for example, the suspicions of criminal actions by the municipality of Haifa, through the Yaffe Nof company, in the last half of the year - total destruction of a section of Nahal Azov designated for preservation in the Haifa plan 2185a - east of the Kastra Mall, except that, contrary to the plan, which is being considered for legislation, and in violation of all laws, the bulldozers are working, the felling plows are working (without building permits and without paving permits) - there is no wadi, there are no trees, even trees that were intended for preservation were cut down and the corruption simply passes, from a project For the project and no one is paying attention and tweeting (with the exception of a specific action detailed in the article which is considered a drop in the ocean and of course there is no criticism here against Attorney Lior Detz who spends days and nights trying to fix even just touching the tip of the iceberg, but that no institutional person from the enforcement and investigation system seems to be helping him - in the hands of the public - to bring about the investigation of the truth and the enforcement of the law - the law that has long since fallen asleep in keeping.
All the best to Lior Detz.
The article speaks for itself. Now everyone knows who it is and what his plots are, which the members of the council were well aware of.
It's a shame that except for council member Motti Blitzblau and the Green faction, all the other council members and of course Klish ignored the serious information they had in front of them....
Kudos to Lior Detz, who in addition to being a lawyer and architect, is fighting for the cleanliness of the authority.
Does Lior Detz do real estate transactions in Haifa?
Is it known who his partners are?