Police probing claim that PM’s chief of staff tried to cover up Bild leak — reports

Reported development comes after new claims made by key suspect Eli Feldstein in TV interview; senior aide to PM said to have kept contact with Feldstein amid downplaying of ties

The Israel Police has opened an investigation into allegations that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s chief of staff, Tzachi Braverman, tried to quash a probe into former Netanyahu spokesman Eli Feldstein’s leak of classified documents to the German Bild tabloid, Hebrew-language media reported Wednesday.

Feldstein made the claim against Braverman in an interview with the Kan public broadcaster last week — his first media appearance since being arrested in October 2024 and later charged for leaking stolen intelligence to Bild the previous month. The publication presented that classified document as evidence that Hamas was not interested in reaching a hostage deal with Israel.

In the interview, Feldstein claimed that Braverman got wind of the secret investigation into the leak to Bild months before it was publicized and had assured Feldstein then that he’d be able to quash the probe.

According to Feldstein’s account, in the same month as he leaked the document, Braverman asked to meet with him in the underground parking of the IDF’s Kirya military headquarters, where he disclosed that the IDF’s information security department had launched a probe into the leak.

Braverman allegedly told Feldstein that the list of suspects went as high as the Prime Minister’s Office and urged him to inform him if he was in any way connected to the leak, as he would be able to “shut it down.”

Braverman, who was recently nominated to serve as Israel’s ambassador to the United Kingdom, should not have had prior knowledge of an internal IDF investigation, nor any ability to “shut it down” on his own.

A statement issued on Braverman’s behalf following last week’s interview accused Feldstein of “lying and making things up.”

“The chief of staff has no ability or influence over ongoing investigations. Braverman only knew about the investigation when it was published by the media,” the statement read.

Also on Wednesday, Channel 12 reported that in recent months, a senior aide to Netanyahu maintained contact with Feldstein, despite official downplaying of any formal connection.

According to the report, Feldstein — who, in addition to the Bild affair, has been implicated in the so-called Qatargate scandal — held at least two meetings over the past month with Topaz Luk, a former Netanyahu spokesman who currently serves as a senior adviser to the premier and is considered one of his closest confidants.

Channel 12 said the contact continued even after restrictions were imposed on Feldstein, with sources in the Prime Minister’s Office describing the relationship as personal rather than professional.

In the Qatargate affair, Feldstein and the prime minister’s top media adviser, Jonatan Urich, are suspected of taking money to spread pro-Qatari messaging to reporters, in order to boost the Gulf state’s image as a mediator in hostage talks between Israel and Hamas, all while in the prime minister’s employ.

Feldstein, in his interview with Kan last week, alleged that Netanyahu was aware and supportive of his efforts to make use of classified intelligence in order to sway public opinion against a hostage deal, effectively contradicting Netanyahu’s assertion that he had no prior knowledge of Feldstein’s leak of the document.

In the wake of the interview, Netanyahu’s Likud party published a statement downplaying Feldstein’s ties to the premier, despite his having been widely known as Netanyahu’s spokesman for military affairs and regularly briefing reporters under that auspice throughout the war.

According to Channel 12, the contact between Feldstein and Luk was recently curtailed, amid public exchanges of accusations on social media.

Requests for comment from the Prime Minister’s Office and from Luk were not answered, Channel 12 said.

Since Feldstein was first arrested last year, Netanyahu’s office has flip-flopped in its position on him. After initially distancing itself from him, when it became clear that the aide had in fact been close to Netanyahu, the PMO shifted to calling him a “patriot.”

But, since he implicated the prime minister and Urich, Netanyahu’s office has turned on him again, accusing him of lying and insisting that the premier and his other staffers did not know about any illicit activity.