Last update - 00:00 21/03/2008
Gov't committee fails to agree on new Supreme Court candidates
By Tomer Zarchin, Haaretz Correspondent
A meeting of the committee for selecting Supreme Court justices scheduled for Sunday was canceled Thursday night after a failure to agree on three candidates.
Justice Minister Daniel Friedmann, who heads the committee, asked that the meeting be canceled due to serious disagreements among its members.
Attorney Yuri Guy-Ron, head of the Israel Bar Association and a member of the committee, believes that the decision to cancel the meeting is wrong and that a decision must be made based on majority vote.
Committee sources said the reason for the disagreement is the refusal of the judges' representatives on the committee - Supreme Court President Dorit Beinisch and justices Eliezer Rivlin and Ayala Procaccia - to consider candidates who have not held temporary appointments on the court.
Attorney Pinhas Marinsky, a committee member, said yesterday that "we need to appoint to the Supreme Court candidates enjoying as broad support as possible." He said that some of the committee members were not willing to consider candidates "who did not serve on the Supreme Court. This is improper, unegalitarian, and does not allow for a fair selection process."
Another member of the committee said that "the judges torpedoed the decision, manipulating the situation on every candidate, and causing disagreement. It was an ugly process and they did not want to weigh this fairly. It seems like a battle of power between the judges and Friedmann."
Nonetheless, it was possible to conclude last night that there were some broad agreements in the committee: No members of the academia will be selected in this round, nor anyone who had private law practices. It is also likely that that, although not certain, Judge Uzi Vogelman, currently on temporary appointment at the Supreme Court, will receive a permanent position.
Most of the committee members agree that justices will be selected from judges who have not served on temporary assignments at the Supreme Court. The only opponents of this are the representatives of judges on the committee.
The reported consensus on Vogelman's candidacy is based on the support of most of the committee members. Vogelman is backed by current Supreme Court President Beinisch, and is also acceptable to her rival, Justice Minister Friedmann.
The justice minister believes that the committee should also consider judges that did not serve on temporary assignment at the court, in order to provide a varied pool of candidates.
Friedmann's view is supported by IBA head Guy-Ron, and Pinhas Marinsky, the two representing active lawyers on the committee. It is also supported by the three politicians on the committee besides Friedmann - Environment Minister Gideon Ezra, MK Orit Noked (Labor) and Gilad Erdan (Likud).
Beinisch and the representatives of the judges on the committee, Rivlin and Procaccia, believe that to prepare justices it is necessary to have temporary appointments to the court, allowing the candidates to be evaluated in "real conditions."
Among the candidates who have served temporarily on the court, Friedmann supports Jerusalem District Court Judge Yosef Alon and Tel Aviv District Court Judge Dvora Berliner. The Supreme Court justices would prefer to see Jerusalem District Court judges Yehonatan Adiel and David Cheshin.
Among the judges who have not served on temporary assignment on the Supreme Court, Beinisch supports Jerusalem District Court Judge Zvi Zylbertal, while Friedmann likes Jerusalem District Court Judge Yehudit Tsur.
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