High Court suggests Shin Bet chief ‘reconsider’ demand to reveal petitioners’ names

Supreme Court President Isaac Amit suggested on Sunday that Shin Bet chief David Zini reconsider his demand that the names of former senior Shin Bet officials who petitioned the High Court against Zini’s appointment be disclosed to him.

Amit made his comments in a hearing over a request by Zini that dozens of former officials be held in contempt of court, despite the High Court stating in December 2025 that petitioners had no right to file a petition without disclosing their names to the subject of their petition.

“In my personal opinion, it would be good if the head of the [Shin Bet] service would reconsider his position. [I am] not sure that it’s doing him any good,” Amit said during the hearing.

Amit’s comment did not challenge the previous assertion of the court that the petitioners were required to reveal their names, but rather appeared to be aimed at concerns over tensions within the Shin Bet following Zini’s appointment.

In October 2025, three former Shin Bet chiefs, together with 186 other former Shin Bet officials, petitioned the court against Zini’s appointment, after the cabinet approved him as the new head of the intelligence agency in September 2025.

Many of the former officials used only their initials on the petition. In its December decision, the High Court rejected the petitions against Zini’s appointment, with Deputy Supreme Court President Noam Sohlberg adding in his written opinion that there was no legal basis for the petitioners to not disclose their names to Zini, although not to the general public.

Sohlberg added, however, in his opinion that Zini should consider dropping his demand for the names to be disclosed since the court was rejecting the petitions against his appointment.

Sohlberg said he was making his suggestion “with a view to smoothing things over, given that the petitioners are former Shin Bet employees who may continue to assist the agency’s work through relevant knowledge they have.”

The former officials have nevertheless failed to disclose their names to Zini since that decision, leading the Shin Bet chief to file a contempt of court motion against them in May.

In a hearing on Sunday, Zini’s lawyer Yaakov Kerem insisted that the former Shin Bet officials could not ignore the High Court’s position that their names be published.

Still, when asked by Amit, he did not explain Zini’s ongoing insistence that the names be published.

Eitan Peleg, an attorney for the petitioners, said the reason for their refusal to disclose their names was for fear of some manner of retribution by Zini against them.

Peleg also argued that the court did not issue an operative order when Sohlberg wrote in his December 2025 ruling that the names of the former officials should be published, and that the court could therefore not find those officials in contempt.

Both Sohlberg and Justice David Mintz said during the hearing that litigants had a right to know who had petitioned against them.

But Sohlberg, in a similar fashion to Amit, said that when he wrote in his December 2025 ruling that Zini should consider dropping his demand, he thought the new Shin Bet chief would agree.

Zini was appointed head of the Shin Bet in September 2025, leading to petitions against the appointment by former Shin Bet officials and government watchdog groups.

The High Court rejected the petitions 2-1, with Sohlberg and Mintz ruling against the petitioners and Amit dissenting.