Talansky Tapes

Secret Tapes Show That L.I. Rabbi Who May Topple Olmert Has a Threatening History

Morris Talansky is the ordained rabbi, former Great Neck macher, and sometimes successful businessman who may bring down the government of Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert. In May, Talansky told Israeli prosecutors that he delivered envelopes of cash to Olmert, which he claimed were for both campaign and personal expenses. Olmert insisted on cash, Talansky said. “I just didn't really understand the system in Israel,” said Talansky, and so he acquiesced.
But in cross-examination scheduled for this week in Israel, Olmert’s lawyers are expected to paint the roly-poly 75-year-old Talansky as an aggressive, threatening businessman who has long had a reputation as a bully. Talansky has characterized himself as a naïve lover of Israel taken advantage of by a cunning politician.

A transcript of secret tapes obtained by New York Magazine suggests that Talansky can indeed be willful and determined, and even threatening.

Twenty years ago Talansky invested in a Pittsburgh office building which quickly went bust. He felt he’d been fleeced by the sellers, among them a couple of Long Island rabbis.

In the 29-page handwritten transcript, Talansky demanded his money back at meetings and in phone calls, which were secretly recorded. If he didn’t get it, he said, there’d be consequences. At one point an angered Talansky suggested that a bomb would be placed in the car of Richard Penzer, the lead seller on the building. One rabbi confronted Talansky over this.

“There were threats mentioned about blowing up his” — Penzer’s — “car,” he told Talansky.

At first Talansky denied that any threats had been made, then he acknowledged the bomb threat.

“Yeah, okay,” he conceded. “That was the anger when millions of dollars are at stake.”

More...

Well, Yes, We Know (and Have Known for Some Time)

Mr. Talansky said of Mr. Olmert, “I only know that he loves expensive cigars, pens, watches; I found it strange, but you know. ...” He shrugged.

And, again, to quote Talansky:-

...he said, he always felt “very, very uneasy” about having to give Mr. Olmert money in cash. “I said to myself, this is absolute insanity,” Mr. Talansky told the court, saying he had long felt that “something was wrong.”

Now, he said, he is angry with Mr. Olmert. “This is no way to build a relationship or to run a country,” Mr. Talansky said.

Talansky (at) Scores, Can You Top This?

Found here:-

Court records include a sworn statement from a police file, dated January 1992, in which a Long Island man said he had met Mr. Talansky one night at Scores, a topless bar in Manhattan, and tried to help him collect a debt from Mr. Penzer.

“He began to tell me about how he took a devastating loss of approximately $2.8 million in a real estate deal that went bad,” the Long Island man, Michael Sciotto, told the police. “He was swindled and he described it as a setup.”

The statement continued, “I told him I would talk to Mr. Penzer and see if I could shake him up a little and possibly could get Talansky’s money back.”

Another profile.

Finally, The News

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert admitted on Thursday that he accepted campaign donations from an American businessman, but denied that they were bribes
and said he would only resign if he were indicted.

Olmert is suspected of illicitly receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars from Morris (Moshe) Talansky, according to the details of an investigation currently being carried out against him.

The Tel Aviv Magistrate's Court on Thursday relaxed a sweeping media gag order that has prevented the reporting of details on the probe, at the request of police and judicial officials. Olmert was questioned last Friday and the gag order was initially meant to remain in place until early next week.



In a terse, late-night televised statement to journalists at his residence in Jerusalem, Olmert said that a lawyer had handled his finances and that everything had been done legally. "I never took bribes, I never took a penny for myself, he said."

He said he would not fight to stay in office if he is charged. "If I am indicted, I will resign my post," he said, adding that he believed the crisis over the investigation would soon blow over.

and here

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is suspected of accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars from an American citizen, Moshe Talansky, various media outlets reported Thursday.

Channel 10 reported that Talansky was a middleman for illegal campaign contributions, and that he readily told Israeli interrogators everything he knew about the case.