For a split second, when the breaking news of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s request to be pardoned by the Israeli president of charges in his corruption trial flashed on my phone’s screen, I thought that at last the Israeli leader had seen sense and understood that the only guaranteed way for him to avoid conviction was to admit at least some guilt and walk toward the sunset of his political life. Was I naive? Was it wishful thinking? Maybe both, although, having observed his behavior throughout his political career, I should have known better.

In his more than 100 pages of argumentation why he should be pardoned, accompanied by a recorded message, there was no trace of regret, remorse, contrition, or admission of guilt, which could have started the process of liberating first and foremost his people from the destructive hold he has on them and the country. Nor did he outline any path toward leaving politics.

Netanyahu did not genuinely request a pardon — he demanded, and on shaky legal grounds, that his court case be stopped. There is only one case in Israel’s legal history in which the president granted a pardon before a trial concluded, and that was when operatives of Shin Beit, Israel’s internal security service, were charged with murdering two Palestinian militants who hijacked a bus, and for Shin Beit’s cover-up of the murder. It was impossible to justify the lenient approach, then, but at least all those involved were forced to leave the service, including the organization’s head. Interestingly enough, the president at the time was Chaim Herzog, father of the current President, Isaac........

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