Attorney-General Avichai Mandelblit filed an indictment on Thursday against the prime minister’s wife, Sara Netanyahu, for fraud with aggravated circumstances and breach of public trust in the “Prepared Food Affair” in an explosive development which shook the country. 
 
 
 
 When Leah Rabin was about to be indicted in 1977, then prime minister Yitzhak Rabin resigned from office due to his wife’s scandal. 
 
 The expectation is that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is not considering such a move, but the indictment damages him politically in an atmosphere in which the Jerusalem Post recently reported he is likely to face an indictment announcement in the coming months or in early 2019.Though the Post had learned around two weeks ago that an indictment would likely be coming down soon, there were continuous efforts to reach a plea deal down to the end, which left things up in the air and created an ongoing drama.Other media had also reported in recent months that the actual indictment could be filed shortly after the Passover holiday, but then Netanyahu’s defense lawyers approached Mandelblit with a dramatic offer.They offered to return some of the funds Netanyahu is accused of obtaining fraudulently and to take public responsibility, as long as she would not be slapped with any kind of criminal record.Ultimately, despite media reports that a deal might be near, the Post’s sources proved correct that no deal was reached, leading to Thursday’s indictment in the Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court.The trial is expected to start after the fall Jewish holidays and Netanyahu is not expected to get jail time even if convicted, but it was important to Mandelblit that she be given a criminal record for her actions.The indictment was also delayed from May until now following Nir Hefetz, a former close adviser to the Netanyahu family, providing new evidence against Sara Netanyahu. Although Hefetz is primarily a state’s witness against the prime minister for Case 4000 the Bezeq-Walla! Affair, he also provided material against Sara.A pre-indictment hearing in January where Sara Netanyahu’s lawyers asked Mandelblit to reverse his preliminary decision in September 2017 to indict her, also had failed to sway him, though Mandelblit issued a statement at the time that he “had an open mind” to their arguments.In the Prepared Food Affair, the attorney-general alleged that from September 2010 until March 2013, Sara Netanyahu acted in coordination with then-Prime Minister’s Office deputy director-general Ezra Seidoff to present the false misrepresentation that the Prime Minister’s Residence did not employ a cook, even though it did during that time.According to the indictment, the two made this misrepresentation to circumvent and exploit regulations that stated, “in a case where a cook is not employed in the official residence, it is permitted to order prepared food as needed.” The two hoped to obtain state funding both for the cook at the residence and for prepared food orders. In this way, the two allegedly fraudulently obtained from the state NIS 359,000 in hundreds of prepared food orders.The indictment states that Netanyahu regularly pressured Seidoff, house managers and others to obtain items for the residence whether they were authorized by law or not. As a result of these pressures, Seidoff sometimes procured items, such as the additional unauthorized prepared food items, despite earlier attempts to explain to her that there was no basis for the state to pay for such items. Also, Netanyahu ordered Seidoff, Naftali and other workers not to reveal the fraud to others.Further, in 15 instances, invoices to chefs who were brought in from outside were falsified in order to circumvent limits on how much could be paid toward outside-chefs. Seidoff directed the chefs, the house managers and Netanyahus' secretaries to falsify the invoices in these 15 instances.Charges against Netanyahu for these 15 instances were previously closed by Mandelblit as there was insufficient evidence to prove that she knew about Seidoff's and the others' actions.The prosecution also indicted Seidoff on Thursday for the same offenses, while adding the offense of falsifying documents and with a total fraud amount of NIS 393,000.Several other cases against Netanyahu were closed in September 2017, but one of them will also impact the indictment.While Mandelbit closed the “Father Homecare Affair” case against Netanyahu due to the small amounts of money involved, evidentiary problems and the difficult emotional circumstances – it will impact the indictment.In the affair, Netanyahu employed S and G for six days and five days respectively to care for her sick and now deceased father. While normally, her father had a different homecare arrangement, during those days that he was staying at the prime minister's residence, his regular arrangement was unavailable.Netanyahu paid S for taking care of her father. However, in addition, S was paid by the state for providing cleaning services. G functioned as a substitute for S when S was unavailable. G was paid by the state for cleaning services.Mandelblit said that since Netanyahu had paid S, was unaware of extra payments to S and that all of the state payments to S and G were small, he would not indict her, but that Netanyahu's pattern of problematic conduct in that case would serve as evidence in the Prepared Food Affair.While Netanyahu was only indicted in the Prepared Foods Affair, Seidoff was also indicted in the Waiters Affair, in which the prime minister's residence in Jerusalem employed waiters over the weekend based on false misrepresentations, and the Electrician Affair, for employing Avi Fahima for electrician work at the prime minister's residence despite knowledge that employing him had been declared an illegal conflict of interest.Responding to the charges, Netanyahu’s lawyer Yossi Cohen told the Post in January that Meni Naftali and other Prime Minister’s Residence managers like him, not Sara Netanyahu, are responsible for the food orders regarding which she is accused.He said Netanyahu’s defenses regarding food orders made in 2010 and 2013, when Naftali was not at the Prime Minister’s Residence, were that those accusations related only to around NIS 134,000.Naftali has already admitted to criminal wrongdoing in this area, so it is just a question of whether the court buys his story or Sara’s about her also being or not being involved. The 2011-2012 period in which he was house manager accounts for around NIS 225,000 of the charges.Cohen further has said that number could be easily reduced to NIS 30,000-NIS 40,000, as many times when prepared food was ordered, the staff cook was sick, traveling or off for Shabbat.Asked if he could prove this argument, Cohen said it is known that the cook was off work for these reasons, and that all he needs to do is raise doubt and force the state to prove that the cook was in fact working at the time. Since he said the state has no way to prove, for example, that the cook was working when around NIS 15,000 was charged for prepared food in January 2011, it cannot prove Netanyahu or anyone else improperly ordered prepared food.Cohen said that if the charges only related to NIS 30,000-NIS 40,000 at most, they could be dropped as relating to an oversight or to a violation too small to be worth prosecuting.Sources close to the case told the Post in September that though there was unanimity within the prosecution about indicting Mrs. Netanyahu in the Prepared Food Affair, there were differences of opinion within the prosecution about closing some of the other cases against her.The Sara Netanyahu cases jumped into the headlines in February 2015 as part of a State Comptroller report and “Bottlegate” and other now closed cases becoming household names. It became a full criminal investigation starting in July 2015. 
 
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 ||||| FILE - In this Wednesday, June 6, 2018 file photo, Israel's Prime Minister's wife Sara Netanyahu arrives for the meeting with French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire at Bercy Economy Ministry, in Paris,... (Associated Press) 
 
 FILE - In this Wednesday, June 6, 2018 file photo, Israel's Prime Minister's wife Sara Netanyahu arrives for the meeting with French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire at Bercy Economy Ministry, in Paris, France. Israeli prosecutors have charged Sara Netanyahu, the prime minister's wife, with a series... (Associated Press) 
 
 FILE - In this Wednesday, June 6, 2018 file photo, Israel's Prime Minister's wife Sara Netanyahu arrives for the meeting with French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire at Bercy Economy Ministry, in Paris, France. Israeli prosecutors have charged Sara Netanyahu, the prime minister's wife, with a series... (Associated Press) FILE - In this Wednesday, June 6, 2018 file photo, Israel's Prime Minister's wife Sara Netanyahu arrives for the meeting with French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire at Bercy Economy Ministry, in Paris,... (Associated Press) 
 
 JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli prosecutors on Thursday charged the wife of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with misusing over $100,000 in public funds to order lavish meals from some of the country's most famous chefs. 
 
 While the prime minister was not directly implicated in the case, the indictment against Sara Netanyahu threatens to embarrass the long-serving leader and brings back attention to his own legal problems. 
 
 Netanyahu has basked in months of political success, including the Trump administration's withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal and its move of the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, taking away attention from a series of corruption investigations facing the prime minister. 
 
 Sara Netanyahu has long faced allegations of abusive behavior and living extravagantly. In 2016, a court ruled she abused an employee and awarded the man $42,000 in damages. Other former employees have accused her of mistreatment, charges the Netanyahus have vehemently denied. 
 
 In Thursday's indictment, the Justice Ministry said Sara Netanyahu was charged with graft, fraud and breach of trust for allegedly overspending more than $100,000 on private meals at the prime minister's official residence, even when there was a full-time chef on staff. A former deputy director of the official residence was also charged. 
 
 Sara Netanyahu acted "to circumvent the rules and conditions" governing the official residence "in order to fraudulently obtain state funding for various expenses for the accused and her family that were not supposed to be financed in this manner," the indictment said. 
 
 If convicted, she could face a maximum sentence of five years behind bars, though that seemed unlikely. It was unclear when her trial would begin. 
 
 There was no immediate comment from her office. 
 
 The indictment threatens to reinforce the unflattering reputation the Netanyahus have gained for enjoying an expensive lifestyle out of touch with most Israelis. Netanyahu also faces several police investigations into alleged corruption. The Netanyahus have denied any wrongdoing, and say they are the victims of a political witch hunt and hostile media. 
 
 Israeli police questioned Netanyahu, his wife and son last week in connection to a corruption case involving the country's telecom giant, Bezeq. Netanyahu is suspected of promoting regulations worth hundreds of millions of dollars for the company in return for more favorable coverage of the Netanyahu family on the telecom company's influential news site. ||||| State attoneys filed an indictment against Sara Netanyahu Thursday for alleged misuse of some $100,000 in state funds. 
 
 Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit and State Prosecutor Shai Nitzan had already notified the prime minister’s wife of their intention to file charges in recent months. 
 
 Negotiations for her to return a portion of the diverted money and confess to the charges in exchange for avoiding prosecution broke down when the prime minister’s wife reportedly refused to pay the sums requested by prosecutors, telling her lawyers she’d rather go to jail than reimburse the state. Her lawyers have denied such reports. 
 
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 In Thursday’s indictment, the prime minister’s wife is charged along with Ezra Saidoff, a former deputy director general of the Prime Minister’s Office, for fraud along with breach of trust. 
 
 The two are accused of fraudulently charging some NIS 359,000 ($100,000) in gourmet meals to the state’s expense between 2010 and 2013, violating laws which ban the ordering of prepared food when a chef is already employed at the Prime Minister’s Residence. 
 
 According to the indictment, Netanyahu falsely claimed there was no cook at the time in the Jerusalem home in order to purchase meals from restaurants. 
 
 The charges against Saidoff are more severe as he is also accused of illicitly hiring chefs and servers for private meals at the Netanyahu home. The PMO staffer also falsified invoices for such activities in order to get them approved. 
 
 The indictment also covers the employment of an electrician, whose hiring had originally been scrapped by the PMO due to the man’s close connection to the Netanyahu family. 
 
 Saidoff is accused of falsifying documents that were used to circumvent the PMO’s original order that the electrician’s hiring be annulled. 
 
 Yehoshua Reznik, lawyer for Saidoff, said the charges were “fundamentally wrong and inconsistent with the legal and factual situation as shown by the evidence in the case.” 
 
 Thursday’s charges come after Nir Hefetz, a former Netanyahu family aide turned state’s witness, provided testimony to prosecutors regarding Sara Netanyahu’s alleged misappropriation of public funds for personal use. 
 
 Last month, TV reports said Mandelblit rejected a proposal from Netanyahu’s attorneys according to which she would confess to the charges and partially reimburse the state, in exchange for the state dropping the probe without indictment. 
 
 State prosecutors were said to have originally recommended that the prime minister’s wife pay NIS 200,000 ($56,000), and confess to the charges in exchange for no indictment against her. Netanyahu rejected that offer, however, reportedly saying that she would rather go to jail than reimburse the state. 
 
 Her attorneys then allegedly offered that their client reimburse the state with NIS 50,000 ($14,000), which prosecutors rejected outright. 
 
 Reports over the weekend had said Netanyahu’s lawyers were seeking to renew talks with prosecutors to reach a deal in the case. 
 
 The decision to launch the investigation into Sara Netanyahu came in light of the state prosecutor’s recommendation, after allegations were raised in a 2015 report by State Comptroller Yosef Shapira that detailed lavish spending at the official residence in Jerusalem, as well as at the Netanyahus’ Caesarea home. 
 
 Under state regulations, cooks at the Prime Minister’s Residence are supposed to supply prime ministers and their immediate families with daily meals. Where cooks are not employed, the PM’s family is permitted to order external meals, up to a maximum cost of NIS 200 ($57) per person plus VAT. The state is also authorized to foot the bill for private guests of the prime minister and his or her spouse so long as this is not a social or family event involving more than 20 people. 
 
 A draft indictment, which was leaked last year, detailed allegedly illegal spending of up to NIS 25,000 (some $7,000) per month by the prime minister’s wife on meals from top restaurants in Jerusalem. It detailed 15 cases in which Sara Netanyahu ordered food from outside chefs including Shalom Kadosh and Lior Hafzadi. 
 
 In addition to the fraud case, Sara and Benjamin Netanyahu have also been questioned as part of the Bezeq telecommunications giant graft probe. The case involves suspicions Prime Minister Netanyahu advanced regulations benefiting Bezeq owner Shaul Elovitch in exchange for positive coverage from Bezeq’s Walla news site. 
 
 Police have also recommended the prime minister himself stand trial for bribery, fraud, and breach of trust in two other cases. The attorney general has yet to decide whether to press charges against the prime minister. 
 
 In Case 1000, Netanyahu and his wife are alleged to have received illicit gifts from billionaire benefactors, most notably the Israeli-born Hollywood producer Arnon Milchan, totaling NIS 1 million ($282,000). In return, Netanyahu is alleged by police to have intervened on Milchan’s behalf in matters relating to legislation, business dealings, and visa arrangements. 
 
 Case 2000 involves a suspected illicit quid pro quo deal between Netanyahu and Yedioth Ahronoth publisher Arnon Mozes that would have seen the prime minister weaken a rival daily, the Sheldon Adelson-backed Israel Hayom, in return for more favorable coverage from Yedioth. 
 
 The premier denies any wrongdoing. ||||| Jerusalem (CNN) The wife of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was charged with fraud and breach of trust Thursday over the alleged misuse of state funds at the couple's official residence. 
 
 In a case known as the "Meals Ordering Affair," prosecutors say Sara Netanyahu used state money to pay for $100,000 worth of meals at the prime minister's residence, according to an indictment filed in Jerusalem's magistrate's court on Thursday. 
 
 Sara Netanyahu also illegally paid approximately $10,000 for private chefs, prosecutors said. 
 
 The charges carry a maximum sentence of 8 years in prison. 
 
 Her lawyers slammed the indictment, describing it as "false and hallucinatory". 
 
 "It's the first time in Israel and in the world that the wife of a leader is put on trial for food entrees," her legal team said in a statement. "There was no fraud, no breach of trust or any other felony. The food was not for the Netnayahu family, but for other people, including workers in the residence. We're certain in the end that justice will speak. Truth and logic will prevail." 
 
 The indictment is a blow to an embattled power couple already facing several other criminal investigations. Benjamin Netanyahu has been named a suspect in two separate criminal investigations and was questioned as a suspect in a third. Police say they have enough evidence to indict the Israeli leader on charges of fraud, bribery, and breach of trust in those cases. 
 
 From April 2009 until March 2013, Sara Netanyahu ordered meals from some of the most expensive restaurants in Jerusalem, according to the indictment, which painstakingly detailed each transaction by month. In December 2011, prosecutors say she ordered meals to the prime minister's residence totaling 24,164 shekels -- more than $6,500 dollars. Just a few months later in April 2012, the family ordered meals amounting to 26,061 shekels -- more than $7,100. 
 
 Sara Netanyahu with her husband Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. 
 
 Under Israeli law, if there is no cook in the prime minister's residence, it is permissible to order prepared food. But prosecutors say the Netanyahu family had a cook in the house and yet still ordered the food, with Israeli taxpayers footing the bill. 
 
 Sara Netanyahu also used state funds to pay waiters to serve the meals on weekends and during private events, according to prosecutors, who said the hand-picked waiters were registered as "extra manpower" or "cleaners" to hide the fact that they were being illegally employed. 
 
 Prosecutors allege that Sara Netanyahu submitted claims "knowing that the claims were not true, believing they were not true, and through these claims, they have received goods by fraud." Prosecutors pointed to the "severity of the circumstances," citing the "sum of money, the planned, continuous, and systemic action, the character of the false presentations, and the carrying out of those deeds in the official residence of the Prime Minister." 
 
 Prosecutors also charged the former Deputy Director-General of the Prime Minister's Office, Ezra Saidoff, with fraud and breach of trust. Prosecutors say he coordinated with Sara Netanyahu, managing the meal payments and invoices to conceal them from oversight. He was also charged with forgery. 
 
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 A lawyer for Saidoff, Yehoshua Reznik, insisted Saidoff had done nothing wrong. "Mr. Saidoff acted with integrity and according to the law in all his actions and were done in coordination with all of the relevant parties in the office. The submission of the indictment sheet against Mr. Saidoff is fundamentally wrong and does not coincide with the factual and judicial situation as it appears from the evidence in the case," Reznik said. 
 
 The latest developments increase the pressure on the Prime Minister, who has already faced numerous calls from opposition politicians to resign. Like his wife, Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly proclaimed his innocence, decrying the investigations as a "witch hunt" and saying "there will be nothing because there is nothing." 
 
 Netanyahu has insisted he will not step down as Prime Minister, though an indictment against him would likely lead to his government coalition partners forcing him out.
– Benjamin Netanyahu is facing a corruption scandal, and now his wife is officially in hot water of her own. It's all about her apparent fondness for expensive meals. Authorities on Thursday indicted Sara Netanyahu on fraud charges over $100,000 in gourmet meals she and a staffer ordered to the prime minister's residence between 2010 and 2013, reports the Times of Israel. The pair allegedly placed the orders to high-end restaurants despite a law forbidding such purchases when a cook is living in the prime minister's residence. Authorities say she and the former deputy director of the prime minister's office, also indicted, falsely claimed that no such cooks were present. The Jerusalem Post reports that negotiations were underway until the last minute to settle the "Prepared Food Affair" short of an indictment, but they fell through. Sara Netanyahu reportedly balked at a deal requiring a confession and a partial repayment, per the Times of Israel. She has previously denied any wrongdoing in the percolating scandal, reports CNN. The first lady could theoretically face five years in prison if convicted, but the AP sees that as unlikely. It wasn't immediately clear when a trial would begin, though the Post notes it's expected to start "after the fall Jewish holidays."