JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Former Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert goes on trial in Jerusalem on Friday, battling the corruption allegations that forced him to resign last year .

Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert attends the weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem March 22, 2009. REUTERS/Uriel Sinai/Pool

He is charged with taking cash payments from a U.S. businessman, advancing the interests of clients of a former law partner and double-billing Israeli charities for overseas travel expenses during fund-raising trips.

The 64-year-old politician, a former mayor of Jerusalem who underwent treatment a few months ago for prostate cancer, denies any wrongdoing.

Olmert is the first Israeli premier to stand trial. Legal experts say if he is found guilty he faces five years in jail on each of the four charges in an indictment filed by prosecutors.

The charges relate to his time as mayor and as industry and trade minister, before he became Israel’s leader in 2006 as head of the centrist Kadima party.

“It is sad, but on the other hand Israelis can be proud of the fact that even a (former) prime minister is not above the law,” said Moshe Negbi, a legal expert at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

The charges against Olmert include fraud, breach of trust and failure to report income. A U.S. businessman has testified in court that he gave Olmert envelopes full of cash totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Olmert says the money was used for electioneering, denying he benefitted personally in return for advancing the businessman’s interests.

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The veteran politician resigned as prime minister in September 2008, saying he wanted to clear his name. But he stayed on as caretaker until March 2009 when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-leaning government was sworn in.

Olmert claimed he had achieved significant progress in talks with the Palestinians aimed at securing a final Middle East peace deal.

But the talks were suspended in December and remain so. The United States is pushing Israeli and Palestinian leaders to resume negotiations.

Olmert’s graft trial is the latest in a series of scandals involving politicians in a country where the legal system says it is waging a battle against corruption.

The previous four prime ministers, including incumbent Netanyahu, now serving a second term, have also fended off various allegations of financial misconduct. None has been indicted.

Israeli courts jailed two former cabinet ministers in June.

Former finance minister Avraham Hirchson, an Olmert ally, was jailed for more than five years for theft, fraud and other offences committed while he was a trade union leader and former welfare and health minister Shlomo Benizri received a four-year jail term for taking bribes while in office.

Former president Moshe Katzav, who resigned in 2007, was indicted in March for rape and other sexual offences against three women who used to work for him, charges he denies.