Appointment of new Supreme Court president in the offing as Levin sets date for vote
Justice minister, after refusing to call a vote for a permanent court chief for over a year, says Judicial Selection Committee will finally convene on November 28
Jeremy Sharon is The Times of Israel’s legal affairs and settlements reporter
After a year of stalling the appointment of a permanent president of the Supreme Court, Justice Minister Yariv Levin on Wednesday finally set a date for the Judicial Selection Committee to convene and conclude the appointment process.
In a statement on Wednesday morning, Levin said he had done so “in accordance with the authorities that have been expropriated from me and in accordance with the High Court of Justice’s order from September 7.”
He set a date for the committee hearing for November 28. Levin said in his statement that he had wanted to call the meeting for next Tuesday, but that it was pushed back till the end of the month at the request of the committee’s secretariat.
Levin had refused to hold a vote in the Judicial Selection Committee to replace former Supreme Court president Esther Hayut for almost a year after she retired in October 2023, until the court, sitting in its capacity as the High Court of Justice, ordered him in September to hold a vote.
The justice minister refused to call a vote on the appointment of a permanent president since he wished to have a conservative installed as head of the court to take the judiciary in a more conservative direction.
Levin did not, however, have the votes in the committee to appoint the only candidate who put himself up for the job other than Justice Isaac Amit. Amit is now the acting president, and is set to become permanent president in accordance with the seniority system in place since the court was founded whereby the justice with most years on the court becomes the next president.
Lacking a majority for his position, the justice minister refused to call a vote, leading a government watchdog group to file a petition to the High Court accusing him of abusing his authority and exerting a de facto veto over the appointment.
The court ruled in favor of that petition in September, stating that although as justice minister Levin had a certain amount of discretion over when to call a vote, that discretion was not open-ended, and he could not grant himself the power to keep the position of the head of Israel’s judiciary unfilled indefinitely.
Following that ruling, and in another apparent effort to stall, Levin decided to nominate all 12 sitting justices for president, and invited members of the public to submit objections to any of the candidates as allowed under the law.
Levin said this decision was based on his desire to allow the public to have their say on who should lead the judiciary, after his right as the government representative for the electoral majority was denied by the court.
But 10 of the justices Levin nominated said subsequently that they did not wish to be considered candidates, leaving just Amit and Justice Yosef Elron, a hardline conservative whom Levin wanted to appoint president.
It remains unclear whether Levin can force the committee to deliberate on the other judges, although his opponents have pointed out that the 1984 Courts Law stipulates that after the committee has been convened, it is the committee itself, through its secretariat, that determines the hearings and work of the forum, not the minister.
If the committee is forced to deliberate on all 12 candidacies, it remains to be seen how long that process will take, although members of the committee have insisted that one way or another there will soon be a new permanent Supreme Court president.
Former Supreme Court justice Uzi Vogelman served as acting president in the year since former president Esther Hayut retired in October 2023, but himself retired at the end of last month and was succeeded by Amit as acting president.
