The real people harmed by Israel’s judicial coup

The Arab man who couldn't purchase a home, the asylum-seeker jailed without trial, the same-sex couple that couldn't adopt. Behind the judicial overhaul are human lives in the balance.

Sigalit Moisa, a single mother of five children – including one with Down syndrome who needed special breathing equipment – had amassed huge debts after her divorce, including to the Israel Electric Corporation.

In 2019, Moisa and three others filed a lawsuit claiming the Electric Corporation policies were unreasonable.

In January 2022, on one of the coldest days of the year, the panel of justices hearing the case released its decision, which opened with the words, “Let there be light.” Justice Daphne Barak-Erez noted in it that under the law, electricity is a basic need, and that it is impossible to live reasonably without it. She ruled that there must be an option to prevent it from being disconnected due to severe financial distress. “In the modern age, electricity is akin to oxygen,” she wrote.

 Moisa is one of many petitioners who may have faced a different outcome under the current law which abolishes the reasonableness standard.

Leah Shakdiel petitioned the court for the right to sit on the Religious Council and overturned its exclusion of women. Arab-Israeli Mohammed "Hamudi" Aburabia ensured a construction company was heavily fined for discriminating against him. Bereaved parent Roni Hirshenson prevented the government from banning Palestinians from attending a joint Parents Circle – Families Forum memorial service.

Gay couple Shay Gortler and Shahar Globerman used the court to enforce their right to adopt a child.  Asylum-seeker Anwar Suleiman successfully appealed against an amendment to the law permitting detention of asylum-seekers without trial in prison.

Israel’s High Court is hearing petitions against the first law in the judicial overhaul, passedon July 24. The law abolishes the reasonableness standard, giving Israeli politicians unprecedented power to pass legislation without judicial oversight.

Thirty-eight Israeli rights organisations this week asked the court to overturn the Netanyahu government's recently passed amendment that seeks to take away the court's ability to strike down government decisions it deems unreasonable.

The petition was signed, among others, by the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, the Aguda for LGBT rights, Mizrahi Democratic Rainbow Coalition, Kav LaOved for disadvantaged workers, The Association for Ethiopian Jews, and the Adalah organisation for Arab minority rights in Israel.

The petitioners claim that the law should be disqualified since it will cause severe harm to the scope of human rights protection, the rule of law, separation of powers, and to moral integrity.

Several petitions against the law have already been filed, including [GU1]  by the Israel Bar Association, the Movement for Quality Government in Israel, the Civic-Democratic organisation and the Darkenu organisation.

Additionally, private individuals, including military personnel, former Knesset members, and social activists, have submitted petitions against the law.

The Supreme Court will begin hearing petitions on September 12.

The High Court of Justice issued an injunction against the government on Wednesday evening, requiring it to explain why the petitions against its controversial reasonableness law should not be struck down by the court.

The type of injunction issued by the court is often seen as switching the burden of explanation from requiring the petitioner to demonstrate why its petition should be accepted, to requiring the respondent to show why it should not be accepted.

In its Wednesday decision, however, the court wrote explicitly that it was issuing the injunction “for the purpose of efficiently dealing with the petitions, and for those reasons alone, without there being any expression of a position on the subject matter itself.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has refused to commit to abiding by the court’s decision.

READ MORE

The first ones to be harmed by Israel's judicial coup (Haaretz)  

 Human rights orgs petition High Court to strike down judicial overhaul law (Haaretz)  

High Court issues procedural injunction against government’s reasonableness law (Times of Israel)

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Photo: Protestors take cover as a police water cannon is fired at them during an anti-judicial overhaul demonstration outside the Knesset on July 24 (Eyal Warshavsky / SOPA Images/Sipa USA)

Photo: Sigalit Moisa, a single mother of five children, petitioned the High Court, who ruled that electricity is a right (Moti Milrod)