Erdan to appoint acting police chief after committee rejects his nomination

Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan will move to appoint an acting police commissioner on Sunday, his office said, after a government vetting panel disqualified his choice for the senior position over ethical concerns.

A Friday statement from Erdan’s office said he would seek government approval to appoint Maj. Gen. Moti Cohen as acting police chief for a period of 45 days, or until a new commissioner is appointed. Current police chief Roni Alsheich is slated to retire on Monday.

Early Friday morning, the Senior Appointments Advisory Committee announced it had rejected Erdan’s nominee for commissioner, Maj. Gen. Moshe Edri, saying his appointment would “damage public trust in the police.”

The decision by the committee, popularly known as the Goldberg Commission, drew harsh criticism from Erdan, who vowed to push ahead with Edri’s appointment despite his disqualification. In an interview with the Kan public broadcaster on Friday, Erdan said he would try to convince the committee to reverse its decision, and if that failed, he would bring Edri’s appointment to the cabinet for a vote.

The committee’s decision also drew criticism from coalition lawmakers, who vowed to back Edri’s nomination in a cabinet vote, and called for the vetting committee to be disbanded.

Jewish Home party leader and Education Minister Naftali Bennett and his political partner Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked slammed the panel’s decision as restricting the cabinet’s sovereignty. Both ministers said they would vote for Edri’s appointment if brought before the cabinet.

Likud ministers Yuval Steinitz, Yariv Levin and Miri Regev also expressed support for Erdan’s nominee, and questioned the need for the appointments committee.

It was not clear whether Erdan sidestepping the government-appointed vetting committee would be legally viable, and a cabinet approval over the committee’s objections would likely lead to legal petitions and a High Court battle.

Edri’s nomination had drawn widespread praise from politicians in Israel. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Edri was a “fitting appointment” and called him a “good and experienced officer.” Edri beat out Jerusalem police chief Yoram Halevi, who was considered the front-runner for the position, and current Tel Aviv police chief David Bitan.

However, despite widespread government support for Edri, questions have been raised over his past conduct and tenure as Jerusalem’s police chief.

Last week, Edri underwent a lie-detector test at the request of the appointments committee due to the sensitive nature of the commissioner position; the fact that there were complaints against him regarding unspecified inappropriate behavior; and the fact that other contenders for the job had already undergone the test.

According to the Goldberg Commission announcement, the decision to put the kibosh on the nomination stemmed from a meeting Edri had during the vetting process with Pinhas Fischler, the lawyer of Israel Tax Authority whistle-blower Rafi Rotem, who has accused police under Edri of harassing him.

Though Edri and Fischler both said the meeting was not about Rotem, Edri apparently failed to disclose it, and the commission wrote that the very fact they met at such a sensitive time was “a failure of behavior and of discretion that leads to inappropriate conduct.

The four-member panel voted 2-2 on Edri, forcing a tie-breaking vote by committee chairman, retired Judge Eliezer Goldberg.

“Public trust in the police to a large degree comes from who the commissioner is,” Goldberg wrote in the majority decision. “The cloud hanging over the meeting would follow the candidate all his years in the job, if he were picked, and thus harm public trust in the police.”

The committee also noted a State Comptroller report that found fault in Edri’s conduct while serving as the head of the Traffic Department of the police. That report, which censured a general “culture of lies” within police, condemned Edri for letting senior officers off the hook on traffic offenses on multiple occasions.

Edri’s nomination also faced opposition from LGBT rights groups in Israel, who criticized his handling of the 2015 Pride Parade in Jerusalem in which ultra-Orthodox extremist Yishai Schlissel stabbed to death 16-year-old Shira Banki and wounded five others.

As Jerusalem police chief, Edri was reprimanded following the murder for ignoring intelligence warnings that Schlissel and others were planning to attack the participants, and not taking additional security precautions to monitor Schlissel or safeguard the event.

Alsheich is to end his term after four years in office. Erdan, who has clashed with the outgoing commissioner, declined to extend his tenure by an additional year.