The businessman Eliezer Fishman passed away

Fishman was an accountant by training until in the 1980s he entered the field of investments and founded the Ronit and Anat funds (named after his daughters). The Ronit Fund collapsed with the bank stock crisis in 1983, but Fishman paid off all debts without entering bankruptcy proceedings. In 1989 he purchased (with investors from the USA) the economic company for Jerusalem from the state, four years later through it he purchased the Mevni Industrial company during its privatization and in 2000 he became its sole owner and thus one of the most prominent in the real estate sector.

Another extensive activity of Fishman was in the field of communication – both telecommunications and media. Over the years he was the owner of the Gold Lines Company, one of the founders of cable television and a 15% owner of the Hot Company, a partner and later the controlling owner of the Globes newspaper and the owner of minority shares in Yedioth Ahronoth Group. Fishman was also involved in retail and his main holding was in the Home Center chain. In 2013, Forbes Israel ranked him 40th in the list of Israel’s richest, with a fortune of NIS 2.7 billion.

Fishman’s business gradually collapsed throughout the last decade, among other things due to huge losses in betting on the Turkish lira in the previous decade and damage to his business in Russia due to the sanctions imposed on it following the invasion of the Crimean Peninsula in 2014. In 2016, he was ordered to pay NIS 200 million to the Tax Authority, which opened bankruptcy proceedings against him after he failed to repay the debt. The banks joined the procedure and the submitted debt claims totaled NIS 4 billion, although not all were approved. The procedure was mostly conducted in a confidential arbitration before the retired president of the Supreme Court, Asher Grunis. A compromise was reached between the parties, the details of which were partially disclosed. At the same time, Fishman’s medical condition worsened and his wife, Tova Fishman, was appointed his guardian. His children – Ronit Ofir, Anat Manifaz and Eyal Fishman – continue to manage part of the family business.