The judicial overhaul debate turned this year's quadrennial elections to the Israeli Bar Association (IBA), generally a ho-hum moment even for the members of the lawyer's guild, into a "wow" moment of profound political significance.
For the last week, these elections have been the subject of intense coverage and lively discussion and debate in the media.
Why? Because the IBA—an organization representing this country's 77,000 licensed lawyers—has two of the nine seats on the Judicial Selection Committee that appoints all of this country's judges.
That gives this body a wildly disproportionate say in choosing the country's judges—an issue at the heart of the judicial overhaul debate currently tearing the country apart. And this explains why there has been so much focus on who will be elected to lead this organization and who it elects to serve on its 44-member National Council that will, in turn, choose its two representatives to the Judicial Selection Committee.
The IBA's disproportionate influence
That committee comprises the Supreme Court president, two other Supreme Court justices, the Justice Minister, another minister, two Knesset members, and two bar association members.
Last week, the nation's attention was riveted on whom the Knesset would select: would it be two coalition members or one coalition and one opposition MK, as has traditionally been the case in the past?
A world war was waged over the two MKs, and due to the coalition's failure to appoint its representative—an opposition MK was selected—the judicial reform negotiations, designed to keep Israel from teetering again on the brink of domestic chaos, were suspended.
Knesset members represent the country's nearly 10 million citizens, two of which are on the selection panel. The Israeli Bar Association represents the country's 77,000 lawyers and it—too—has two members on the selection committee.
Because of its outsized influence on an issue that has turned into one of domestic war and peace, all eyes have been focused for days on these otherwise uninspiring elections.
The spotlight has highlighted the IBA's absurdities
Rarely in Israeli politics have so many paid so much attention to so few. The spotlight that this has shined on the IBA has revealed a number of absurdities.
First, it seems absurd that this body—again, an organization representing only 77,000 lawyers—has the same number of representatives on the Judicial Selection Committee as the Knesset members, representing nearly 10 million Israelis.
Second, it highlights the absurdity of a situation where lawyers on the selection committee or the IBA National Council that selected them will in the future be trying cases in front of judges whose careers they themselves promoted (talk about a conflict of interest).
And third, it feels absurd because one of those candidates who ran to lead the IBA—Efi Nave—stepped down in 2019 after being arrested on suspicion of working for the judicial appointment of a woman in exchange for sexual favors. The State Attorney decided not to prosecute this case because key evidence in the trial was obtained illegally by hacking into Nave's phone and would not have stood up in court.
But that's not all, last year Nave was convicted of smuggling a woman—who today is his wife—through passport control at Ben Gurion Airport in 2018 when he was entangled in divorce proceedings with his previous wife. Nave lost an appeal in the Lod District Court to overturn this conviction but has said he intends to take it to the Supreme Court.
The attention these elections have generated has shined the spotlight on the leadership of the IBA. After resigning in 2019, Nave was replaced by Avi Himi, who resigned himself earlier this year after being accused of sexual harassment of a lawyer during a Zoom call when she was seeking his support for a judicial appointment.
Back-to-back scandals in the IBA have done little to enhance this organization's image in the public's eyes. And that this scandal-ridden guild has such a disproportionate say in the judicial selection process is certainly one reason of many that the public's trust in the judiciary—as reflected in polls—has dropped precipitously.
Other reasons for that decline in trust are Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's non-stop attacks on the judiciary since he was indicted in 2016, as well as the indictments themselves and the way the prosecution has handled the case.
Some of the problems that surfaced in the IBA elections reflect wider problems in the country.
First, the idea that the representatives of some 77,000 people will have such a disproportionate sway on such a significant issue. Many in this country feel underrepresented and disenfranchised and feel that their voices do not have the same weight as the voices of others.
Secondly, the Nave saga—though not the same—carries with it the scent of Arye Deri saga. Deri was convicted of bribery in 2000 and imprisoned for 22 months. After sitting out of politics for the mandatory period, he returned in 2013, rose again to a ministerial position, again got in trouble, and copped a plea bargain.
Yet of all the people in the country, Netanyahu insisted -- after his election in November -- on tapping Deri as a senior minister.
Likewise, Nave. The sex-for-a-judical-appointment accusation was thrown out because of evidence-gathering issues, and he was eventaully convicted of something completely different. But this raises the question: of the 770,000 lawyers in the guild, is there no one else with a cleaner slate that the attorneys could find to be one of the two leading candidates?
And finally, the public discussion over these elections, unfortunately, echoes the predominant tone of public dialogue in this country. Turn on the television and the radio, and the issue being discussed by the learned panelists regarding these elections was not why Nave's leading opponent Amit Becher should head this organization, but rather why Nave should not.
And that is reflective of a broader malaise that has overtaken Israel’s political discourse: it is destructive, not constructive; it is defined by what people are against, not what they are for.
This is even reflected in the shorthand used to define the camps: there is the anti-Netanyahu camp and the camp opposed to “judicial reform” or, depending on one's viewpoint, against the "judicial coup."
Constructive discourse is marked by logical reasoning and respectful communication to build understanding. In a constructive argument, people present their viewpoints, provide solid reasoning to support those viewpoints, then listen to opposing perspectives and engage in productive dialogue.
But that's not what we have here, neither in the debate over the IBA elections nor in the country itself. Instead, the country is drowning in destructive arguments that are preponderantly negative, center around personal attacks and focus on winning at all costs rather than seeking understanding and looking for a solution.
Destructive argumentation thwarts headway, harms relationships and generates hostility. That was the tenor of the IBA election campaign, and it is also what has characterized the debate over the judicial reform.