Russia has come for the property of repatriates already in Israel: 22 cases, 70 million shekels, and a question for the Ministry of Justice

Russian entities are attempting to use Israeli courts to gain access to the property of 22 repatriates worth about 70 million shekels. The strangest part of this story: Israeli law already has a provision allowing for refusal of such cooperation.

On September 2, 2026, a question surfaced in Israel that had not been publicly discussed much before: Russian entities are conducting 22 proceedings here against Jews who repatriated from Russia and obtained Israeli citizenship. This is no longer about accounts or property left in Moscow. Russian managers are trying to gain access to these individuals’ assets within Israel. The total value of the disputed property is estimated at a minimum of 2 billion rubles — about 70 million shekels.

I, Alexander Khmelnitsky, while analyzing this story for NANovosti, specifically checked that Israeli law does not require the court to automatically accept any Russian proceeding: Article 316 allows for refusal of recognition if it contradicts public order, is associated with fraud, or if the person did not actually have the opportunity to defend themselves.

Ynet’s investigation from September 2, 2026 describes a scheme through cross-border bankruptcy procedures. After a Russian court decision, a foreign manager approaches Israel and requests recognition of the Russian proceeding. If the court agrees, it may lead to a ban on disposing of property, obtaining information about assets, and other protective measures. In certain cases, the matter may even reach the realization of property.

But there is a detail here, without which the whole story turns into too convenient a slogan. This is not a law specifically written for Russia, nor is it Moscow’s right to automatically enforce any Russian judgment in Israel. The legal mechanism is found in Part IX of the Israeli Insolvency and Economic Rehabilitation Law of 2018, which regulates international bankruptcy procedures.

And that’s why the question to Israel becomes more unpleasant, not simpler.

The law allows cooperation with Russia. But it also allows for refusal.

Part IX indeed provides for the recognition of foreign proceedings. After recognizing the main foreign process, the court can freeze debt collection, stop the transfer or encumbrance of the debtor’s property, and grant the foreign manager additional powers.

However, the same law contains Article 316. The Israeli authority has the right to refuse recognition of a foreign proceeding or providing assistance if it may violate public order. There are also two other cases specifically mentioned: the foreign procedure was conducted fraudulently, or the debtor was not given a reasonable opportunity to present their arguments and evidence. This is written directly in the law, not invented by the lawyers of the current figures.

It turns out to be a strange construction.

The legislator foresaw the situation back in 2018 when a foreign judicial document is insufficient. And after February 24, 2022, a question arose that simply did not exist in its current form at the time of the law’s adoption: what to do with the decisions of the judicial system of a state conducting a full-scale war against Ukraine, under extensive international sanctions, and accused of using criminal and economic mechanisms against political opponents and emigrated entrepreneurs?

Israel has not yet provided a separate systemic response to it.

NANovosti — News of Israel | Nikk.Agency has already written about how Russian financial mechanisms continue to directly affect the country’s citizens. In the summer, the Knesset dealt with the cessation of Russian pension payments to repatriates — an issue that quickly ceased to be a mere banking problem and turned into a diplomatic and state one. Now the situation is almost mirrored: then money from Russia stopped coming to Israel, and now the Russian procedure itself comes here for money and real estate.

Boris Spiegel: from Kremlin ties to a villa in Savion

The most famous name among the 22 figures is Boris Spiegel, a 73-year-old former member of the Federation Council of Russia and an entrepreneur associated with the pharmaceutical group Biotek.

And here the biography matters.

Spiegel was not a person who had been in open opposition to the Kremlin for decades. On the contrary, he was deeply embedded in the Russian political system and simultaneously participated in the development of relations between Russia and Israel. During his tenure as a senator, Spiegel headed the Russia-Israel Friendship Society. Israeli politicians and advisors to the Prime Minister turned to him for help in contacts with Moscow. He was involved in promoting a visa-free regime, a pension agreement for repatriates, and the memorial project in Netanya, which Putin opened in 2012.

In 2021, Spiegel was arrested in Russia. In 2024, the court found him guilty of bribing the former governor of the Penza region, Ivan Belozertsev, and sentenced him to 11 years in prison. Spiegel himself considers the case fabricated for the seizure of his business. In November 2024, he was released from further serving his sentence due to severe health conditions, after which he ended up in Israel. His former wife, Evgenia Spiegel, received 8.5 years and remains in Russia.

The Russian side is now trying to reach the family villa in Savion, where Boris Spiegel lives. The basis is the bankruptcy of Evgenia Spiegel, and the amount of one of the claims is 202 million rubles — more than 7 million shekels.

Lawyer Mark Knizhevsky claims that Spiegel is formally only a third party in the proceedings against his former wife, but his rights to the property are already under serious restrictions. The family has appealed to the Ministry of Justice and is preparing a petition to the BAGATZ.

There is no need to declare Spiegel innocent in everything that happened in Russia in advance. The Israeli court exists to separate a proven creditor’s claim from a situation where bankruptcy may be used as a continuation of political or property persecution.

And this should be checked here according to Israeli rules, not because a folder with stamps arrived from Moscow.

Eduard Kabakov: an apartment in Bat Yam and a case for $9 million

The second named participant of the group is Eduard Kabakov from Bat Yam, the former head of the Tatarstan insurance company NASCO.

Kabakov claims that a claim of about $9 million was filed against him in Russia based on documents with a forged signature. According to him, the forgery was proven even in a Russian court, and the corresponding claim was removed. But since the Russian bankruptcy procedure is formally not closed, the related proceeding in Israel continues and affects his apartment.

This is still Kabakov’s position, not an established fact by the Israeli court. Similarly, it cannot be written without verification that all 22 cases were fabricated personally by the Kremlin.

But Israel must answer another question: what level of trust can be automatically given to documents of the Russian judicial system today?

An unnamed senior minister told ynet that Israel turned out to be the only Western country allowing Moscow to use such a mechanism. His words deserve attention, but this is precisely a minister’s statement, not a proven comparative legal fact. For example, in 2024, a US federal court recognized the Russian bankruptcy procedure of Alexander Sabadash. However, the same court then significantly limited the powers of the Russian manager, separately considering sanctions and the possibility of asset transfer in the interests of the Russian financial system.

So there is not only a choice between “recognize everything” and “recognize nothing.”

One can recognize the existence of a foreign proceeding — and simultaneously demand additional verification, limit asset transfer, find out who will ultimately receive the money, consider sanctions, and apply the public order exception.

And Israel’s relations with Moscow again find themselves at the center of the story.

These 22 cases did not arise in a vacuum.

Recently, NANovosti analyzed the story of Russian assistance to Iran and the C430L project. Moscow maintains diplomatic relations with Israel but simultaneously deepens cooperation with a state that directly threatens our country.

There is also another dispute, literally about Israeli real estate. In August, we thoroughly analyzed the story of the Alexander Courtyard in Jerusalem and the question of how far the Israeli government should go to meet Russian state and related structures in property matters.

Now it’s no longer a historical building in the center of Jerusalem and not big geopolitics.

These are apartments, villas, and the money of Israeli citizens.

The state, of course, is not obliged to declare every decision of any Russian court invalid just because it is Russian. That would be another extreme.

But pretending that nothing has changed since February 2022 is already quite difficult.

For me, there is a simple boundary here. Repatriation should not mean that a person crossed the border of Israel, obtained citizenship, built a new life here — and then found in the Israeli court a continuation of the same Russian case from which, as they claim, they tried to escape.

If the claim is genuine, commercial, and proven — the court will consider it.

If it involves political persecution, fraud, forged documents, or a proceeding in which the person was effectively deprived of the opportunity to defend themselves, Israeli law already now allows saying “no.”

That’s why the explanation that the Ministry of Justice supposedly “can do nothing” looks especially strange.

Article 316 exists.

The Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not provide a substantive response to ynet’s request. The group’s lawyers demand stopping the acceptance of new Russian proceedings until the legislation is changed, and the Spiegel family is preparing to appeal to the BAGATZ. The investigation itself warns: the current 22 processes may only be the beginning.

The State of Israel was created, among other things, as a place where a Jew can receive protection after fleeing persecution. Therefore, the question here is not only about Russian debts and bankruptcy procedures.

The question is much more specific: will the Israeli court check what exactly Moscow has brought to it for execution before the Russian decision reaches the home of an Israeli citizen?