At the recommendation of Petah Tikva Court vice president Judge Avraham Tal, Meir Rabin, a suspect in the Holyland case, withdrew his appeal filed with the magistrates count last Wednesday against the extension of his remand by six days.
After the court hearing, Rabin's attorney said Adv. Giora Zilbershtein said, "I accept the court's proposal to withdraw Rabin's appeal because his remand ends tomorrow. The court told me that the material it reviewed indicated that there are new issues under investigation, and that Rabin's release was liable to disrupt the investigation."
Rabin has been under arrest since April 6. He is suspected of being a key middleman in transferring money from the Holyland project developers to public officials at the Jerusalem Municipality and Israel Land Administration (ILA) in order to promote the huge real estate project. He is also suspected of serving as a middleman between former Bank Hapoalim chairman Dan Dankner and former ILA chairman Yaakov Efrati, in order to get agricultural land owned by Israel Salt Industries Ltd., owned by the Dankner family, rezoned for residential use.
At the hearing to extend Rabin's remand for the fourth time last week, the judge said that Rabin was suspected of involvement in 18 different cases now under investigation by the police.
In a separate development, Shula Zaken, who served as bureau chief to former prime minister Ehud Olmert, is due to appear at the Rishon LeZion Magistrates Court today for the extension of her remand.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on May 2, 2010
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