Israeli Lawmaker Aryeh Deri Resigns as Part of Plea Bargain

Aryeh Deri, the leader of Israel’s Sephardic Orthodox Shas party, resigned from the Knesset on Sunday, as part of a plea bargain under which he will admit to tax offenses but will not be barred from running again for office. Under the agreement he will admit to not reporting income in two of the cases and pay a $58,000 fine.

Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit agreed to not require a finding of moral turpitude if Deri would resign his current seat in Knesset; such a finding would have required him to sit out of politics for the next seven years. The plea deal has not yet been approved by the court.

Deri’s resignation letter delivered personally on Sunday to Knesset speaker Micky Levy will officially take effect on Tuesday morning. Deri will, however, remain the head of Shas.

Deri, who first became a member of Knesset in 1988, served a three-year jail sentence until 2002 on charges of bribery, fraud and breach of trust for taking bribes while serving as interior minister with a finding of moral turpitude, and was permitted to return to politics in 2013.