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The return of Rabbi Yoshiyahu Pinto to Israel is accompanied by significant news coverage of the case involving the rav and former Israel Police officials. In addition to being questioned by police for hours, Rabbi Pinto agreed to take a polygraph exam. Reports signal that he passed the lie detector test with flying colors and while the results of the polygraph are not admissible as proof in a court of law, police are now more likely to direct suspicions at Menashe Arbiv, the former commander of the department elite 433 investigations unit.

Pinto told investigators that he does not deny giving money to Arbiv’s family as was reported in the past. Pinto explains that he assisted the Arbiv family as he does for many families who approach him with an outstretched hand. Rabbi Pinto explains that Arbiv was once a close follower and when he asked for assistance while his family was in NYC he accommodated, stressing this was not a bribe in any sense of the world.

Having emerged from the polygraph with a clean slated, police are now more likely to move ahead in the direction of filing an indictment against Arbiv. Police are trying to get his son Tzachi to return to Israel from Australia, but to date all requests have been ignored. Police officials told the media the department is willing to undertake paying the younger Arbiv’s expenses while in Israel but he still fails to comply voluntarily.

See the Channel 10 News report in Hebrew:

(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)