Former Israeli minister starts jail sentence for fraud

JERUSALEM: A former Israeli minister on Sunday started serving a 15-month jail sentence for fraud and breach of trust, judicial sources said. Stas Misezhnikov, who was tourism minister from 2009 to 2013, was sentenced to prison in October for handing one million shekels ($280,000) in financial support to a student festival while securing a job at the event for a woman with whom he had an intimate relationship. Misezhnikov starts serving time as public pressure increases to demand legal action against “corrupt” officials and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu himself faces two separate graft probes. Misezhnikov is a member of Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman´s ultra-nationalist Yisrael Beitenu party.