Last Tuesday’s High Court of Justice ruling, which upheld the state’s argument that declassifying historical Shin Bet security service documents could “endanger national security,” is a major blow to historical research and the principle of the public’s right to know. In its archives, far from the eyes of both the public and the state archivist, the Shin Bet stores a great many historical documents related to affairs of supreme public and national importance. Some of them remain controversial to this day. Others are still considered bleeding wounds in the heart of Israeli society. Now, the age