High Court pushes AG and PM’s office to find solution to rift over appointing next Shin Bet chief

The High Court of Justice tells Cabinet Secretary Yossi Fuchs and the Attorney General’s Office to take extra time to find a mutually-agreeable solution to the question of whether Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may nominate the next Shin Bet chief.

The judges order the two sides to appear before them again in a hearing on July 6 to update the court on where they stand.

Following the end of a lengthy hearing in the court today, Fuchs relayed information regarding security issues pertaining to the appointment of a new head of the Shin Bet to the three judges presiding over the case, and in the presence of representatives of the attorney general.

The court says following that closed-door session that it agreed to the request of both sides to allow more time to reach an agreement.

“We are hopeful that an agreed-upon resolution will be found which will avoid a ruling on the petitions under consideration,” the court says.

During the hearing, Judges Alex Stein and Gila Canfy Steinitz were strongly critical of the attorney general’s position that Netanyahu cannot nominate a new Shin Bet chief due to a conflict of interest she said he has owing to the ongoing criminal investigations into his close aides being conducted by the Shin Bet and the police.

The two judges said that other solutions were available other than barring the prime minister outright from making the nomination. High Court President Isaac Amit said, however, that he was troubled by the involvement of the prime minister in the nomination process due to the conflict of interest.