The Lod Central District Court ruled on Thursday that police must return three mobile phones seized from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s adviser, Yonatan Urich, rejecting the state’s request to keep the devices until future technology might allow investigators to unlock them.
Within the broader “Qatargate” probe into Qatari influences over figures close to the prime minister, the court found that police had failed to meet the basic legal threshold required to continue holding the devices.
Months after the phones were taken, investigators still cannot access them, and they offered no timeline for when that might change.
Court ruled continued seizure unsupported by law
Without a realistic prospect of opening the devices and without specific evidence pointing to what might be found on them, Lod District Court Judge Michal Brant concluded that continued seizure would be disproportionate and unsupported by law. In her reasoning, she stressed that modern phones contain intensely personal information and that indefinite deprivation of such property cannot rest on speculation or hope for future technological breakthroughs.
Urich is a central figure in the “Qatargate” affair, an investigation examining alleged foreign contacts, classified information leaks, improper benefits, and suspected political influence operations involving figures close to Netanyahu.
He was detained for questioning in March. During the first detention, police searched his home and seized a phone and a laptop; during the second, they took an additional mobile phone. Investigators argued that Urich had used encrypted platforms, including WhatsApp, to communicate with other suspects and with foreign actors, and that earlier phone extractions in the case had already yielded meaningful findings. On this basis, they maintained that the seized devices were likely to hold relevant data, even if they were purchased after the alleged offenses.
Brant noted that the police were still unable to unlock the devices and could not say when they might be able to do so. In one case, extraction had not been attempted at all; the court found that the state was effectively asking to hold the devices without any horizon or timetable, something the law does not allow.
The judge also accepted the defense argument that the phones were bought after the period of the suspected offenses, which weakens the claim of direct relevance. While she acknowledged that later conversations could still be meaningful, she determined that the state had not shown any concrete indication that such material existed.
The court further reaffirmed that Urich has a constitutional right not to provide his phone passwords, and that exercising this right cannot be treated as a penalty. The judge stressed that the issue was not the legality of searching the phones - that would require a separate warrant - but rather the legality of continuing to hold them without a sufficient evidentiary basis. In her view, the state’s position rested largely on the hope that technological advances would eventually allow access, a rationale she deemed insufficient for prolonged seizure.
A clear win for Urich
The ruling forces investigators to continue the high-profile investigation without access to what they presumably had viewed as potentially important devices. It also reinforces the courts’ insistence on robust digital-privacy protections, even in cases that intersect with national security, foreign influence, and political corruption.
For Urich, the decision is a clear win: after months in which the police could not open his phones, the court determined that the balance between investigative interest and individual rights now falls decisively on his side. For law enforcement, the ruling underscores that investigative delays and technological uncertainty cannot justify holding a suspect’s digital property indefinitely.