The Tel Aviv District Court resumed hearing the testimony of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on corruption charges against him in three cases on Monday. The hearings are being held at a pace of three sessions, three days a week, but the trial has been repeatedly interrupted following Netanyahu's prostate surgery and his trip to Washington last week.

Today, the judges asked Netanyahu's attorney, Amit Haddad, to estimate how long Netanyahu's testimony will take. Haddad replied that "we expect, in an optimistic estimate, 12 sessions, and 14 sessions in a less optimistic estimate" regarding Case 4000, "and about ten sessions regarding the second and third charges (i.e. Cases 1000 and 2000), and a total of 24-25 sessions."

Attorney Jack Chen, the attorney for Shaul and Iris Elovitch, the defendants in Case 4000, said that he would need two more sessions to investigate Netanyahu, while the attorney general's representative, Yonatan Tadmor, said that in the counter-investigation of Netanyahu and other witnesses, "we will make an effort not to reach 120 sessions."

Judge Rivka Friedman-Feldman told Haddad, "We have had nine hearings so far, and we have listened very patiently, and our feeling is that there has to be some change," but Haddad replied, "We are only at the beginning of the road."

"Nothing should be presented on the screen," the judge added. "We feel that there should be a change in the investigation," said Judge Oded Shoham. "The point is the subject of details (i.e., the cases in which, according to the indictment, demands were conveyed to change the media coverage to support Netanyahu on the Walla website, which was owned by the Elovitches). It seems to me that we are beginning to understand the general trend, and there seems little benefit in addressing all the details."

Netanyahu approached the judges asking to be allowed to speak and they agreed, but they rejected his request to do so behind closed doors.

Netanyahu addressed the continuation of his testimony, saying, "This bribery that I am accused of is about 315 details, and any one of them constitutes bribery. And so they have been bothering me and bothering an entire country for years, and I believe that it is my right and my duty to answer each one of these details."

Netanyahu added, "This amount is significant and its review is significant. From an ethical standpoint, this requires me to be given the right to defend myself. I said, 'Go to arbitration,' and they (the prosecution) refused. They refused to cancel items (in the indictment). Following their refusal, I demand the right to answer every detail."