An Israeli court convicted on Monday former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in a trial for corruption linked to a major property development in occupied al-Quds (Jerusalem).

An Israeli court convicted on Monday former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in a trial for corruption linked to a major property development in occupied al-Quds (Jerusalem).

The ruling marks the first time a former Israeli premier has been convicted of bribery in what has been called one of the worst corruption scandals in the Zionist entity’s history.

According to public Channel 1 television, Olmert was convicted of receiving bribes in two separate cases, one of which was linked to construction of al-Quds residential complex dating from when he was the city's mayor.

Olmert was in 2010 named as the key suspect in the so-called “Holyland affair” on suspicion that he received bribes totaling some 1.5 million shekels ($430,000, 312,000 Euros), although the prosecution later reduced the sum received by about half.

Olmert was mayor of Jerusalem from 1993 to 2003, after which he served as a cabinet minister, holding the trade and industry portfolio as well as several others, before becoming premier in 2006.

He led the center-right Kadima party into government, but resigned from the premiership in September 2008 after police recommended that he be indicted in several graft cases.

In July 2013, a Jerusalem court found Olmert guilty of breach of trust in a closely watched corruption case, but cleared him on two more serious charges related to the alleged receipt of cash-stuffed envelopes and multiple billing for trips abroad.

He was fined $19,000 and given a suspended jail sentence for graft.
The conviction related to favors that Olmert granted a former colleague while serving as the trade and industry minister.