The Knesset will choose its representatives in four judicial appointment committees on Wednesday afternoon, in a vote that is likely to determine the course of the ongoing talks at the President’s Residence over the government’s controversial judicial reforms.
The four committees include the Judicial Selection Committee, which chooses judges at all levels of Israel’s court system, and three committees that choose religious court judges – the Dayanim Selection Committee for Jews, the Kadim Selection Committee for Muslims, and the Kadim Madhab Selection Committee for Druze.
Voting in the Knesset plenum will begin at 11:30 a.m. and the results will be published approximately three hours later, according to a Knesset statement.
The nine-member Judicial Selection Committee includes two representatives from the Knesset.
Although not required by law, the coalition traditionally occupies one spot and enables the opposition to occupy the other. The opposition coalesced around representative MK Karin Elharrar (Yesh Atid), but as of Tuesday afternoon the coalition still had eight candidates: Shas MK Uriel Busso, Otzma Yehudit MKs Yizhak Kroyzer and Limor Son-Harmelech, and Likud MKs Tally Gotliv, Eli Dalal, Moshe Saada, Moshe Pasal and Avichai Boaron.
PRIME MINISTER Yair Lapid, Defense Minister Benny Gantz and Energy Minister Karin Elharrar attend a news conference on the maritime agreement with Lebanon, at the Prime Minister’s Office, last week. (credit: OLIVIER FITOUSSI/FLASH90)The vote is anonymous, and therefore if more than one coalition candidate remains by the time the vote starts, there is no way to ensure ahead of time that one spot will go to the opposition.
Possible effects of the committee vote on the reform negotiations
The Judicial Selection Committee is likely to affect the ongoing talks at the President’s Residence.
If Elharrar is not elected, both National Unity chairman MK Benny Gantz and Yesh Atid chairman MK Yair Lapid threatened that they will leave the talks.
However, if Elharrar is chosen, the coalition and opposition could reach agreements within a short amount of time over two relatively minor issues in the reform. The first would enable government ministers to hire private representation when their policies are challenged in court if the Attorney-General does not agree to represent them, and the second would limit the Supreme Court’s ability to use the “reasonableness factor” when evaluating the legality of government decisions.
If the talks blow up, the coalition may choose to continue with some of the judicial reform bills without agreement. This will likely lead to an increase in protests.
A group of activists within the Likud called “Forum Dror” that support the judicial reforms sent messages to the party’s MKs on Tuesday demanding that the coalition not give the opposition a spot on the committee.
“Without transparent and clear agreements between the coalition and opposition that are worth something, the opposition should not be given a spot on the Judicial Selection Committee,” the group said, adding that “the opposition already has three judges in the committee, and probably two members of the Israel Bar Association. They do not need another representative, and surely not Karin Elharrar.”
“Without transparent and clear agreements between the coalition and opposition that are worth something, the opposition should not be given a spot on the Judicial Selection Committee.”
Forum Dror
According to current law, the committee includes three High Court justices, one of whom is the chief justice; two ministers, one of whom is the justice minister; two Knesset members; and two representatives of the Israel Bar Association (IBA). One each of the judges, ministers, MKs and IBA representatives must be a woman.
The makeup of the committee is one of the most contentious issues in the government’s judicial reforms.
Justice Minister Yariv Levin and other proponents of the judicial reforms argue that the Bar Association members have an interest in siding with the judges before whom they appear in court. This gives the judges a de facto majority in the committee and the ability to choose whomever they see fit. Levin argued that the elected representatives of the people should be the ones appointing the nation’s judges, and therefore proposed to amend the committee’s makeup such that the coalition has a majority.
The opposition, however, argued that giving the coalition complete power over judicial appointments will turn these appointments into part of the political give-and-take, and thus create a system where judges are chosen due to their political affiliations and not their skill or expertise.
The Supreme Court members of the committee are Chief Justice Esther Hayut, Justice Uzi Fogelman and Justice Yizhak Amit; the second minister has yet to be chosen, but Ynet reported on Monday that Netanyahu was considering appointing National Missions Minister Orit Struk (Religious Zionist Party); the two Knesset members will be elected on Wednesday; and the Israel Bar Association is voting for its chairperson and executive committee on June 20, and will choose its representatives on the committee soon after.
The committee could therefore be ready to convene by the end of June. However, the justice minister has the power to decide if and when the committee convenes, and Justice Minister Yariv Levin may choose not to do so.
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