District Court Judge Michal Agmon Gonen Broke a new record of legal bullying and judicial activism. I thought we had already seen everything about judicial activism, but then Dr. Agmon Gonen came and taught me that we had not seen anything yet.
Agmon Gonen, with the flick of a pen and with a momentary decision and in the presence of one party, completely canceled the outline of Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked. It will be recalled that a petition was filed against Shaked’s outline in the High Court. Yes.
Judge Agmon Gonen ruled that there was no need to wait for the High Court ruling and that the state’s response was not at all interesting.
Let’s start with the case story: L., a citizen of Ukraine, arrived in Israel in 2017 on a tourist visa. She then filed an individual application for asylum. After her application was rejected outright, she remained in Israel illegally for four years. In May 2021 she was arrested for illegal stay, she admitted that she simply enjoyed her stay in Israel and therefore did not leave. According to her, she met a man here in Israel and she wanted to marry him (it should be noted that she claimed she was already married to a Ukrainian man) but in the end it did not materialize. On May 10, 2021, she was expelled from Israel.
Now, in March 2022, she is back in Israel again, having fled Ukraine to Slovakia, and from there to Brussels, the capital of Belgium. From there she flew to Ben Gurion Airport. In border control she presented herself under a new name than the name in which she introduced herself during her previous stay in Israel. In addition, she even acted in violation of the procedure and did not pre-arrange her arrival with who she defines as a close friend of hers.
Is Netanya safer than Brussels?
Judge Agmon Gonen ruled that she was not interested, she did not need any legal reason, law, government decision or anything. The only source that was actually quoted by Agmon Gonen is a poem by the poet Wislawa Szymborska. Do you think I’m kidding? Unfortunately not at all.
Agmon Gonen stated that “those who escaped from the inferno should not be sent from here, from moment to moment. Those who escaped the horrors of war. “.
This is, of course, demagoguery. As the Court of Appeals ruled, the State of Israel will not return it to Ukraine but to the capital of Belgium, a country that is a member of the European Union that will not return emissions back to Ukraine. Is Netanya safer than Brussels?
According to Agmon Gonen, “she should be allowed to stay in Israel, and try to recover, even slightly from the past trauma.” She added that “in other cases, when people fled the inferno of the war, they were allowed, even in the first stage, to remain in Israel.” For this purpose, Agmon Gonen refers to the decision of the Supreme Court in Case 156/20 in 20.6. I entered into the decision, and nothing like that is written. Barak-Erez also wrote later that “at this stage I did not see fit to grant the request for temporary relief, given the fact that the temporary relief overlaps, in fact, with the main relief sought in the appeal.” What is Agmon-Gonen talking about? I have no idea It refers to another decision, this time HCJ 4630/17 dated 25.4.21.
What was the subject there? “We have before us two petitions concerning the ongoing delay in processing the asylum applications submitted by infiltrators who are Sudanese nationals from the Darfur region and the Nova and Blue Nile region.” What is the connection at all for the sake of the name between the ruling of the High Court and our case? Even if one really tries to find a connection, it is impossible to find one.
Agmon Gonen, sitting as a High Court judge, added that “I believe that at this time the applicant should be allowed and allowed, and that she should stay in Israel. It is appropriate for the State of Israel to leave the petitioner and her peers ‘in some life’ as the poet puts it, until the end of the battles, which are still going on and becoming difficult and bitter from day to day. At this time compassion is required. Human compassion. Therefore, a temporary order is hereby issued to prevent enforcement measures against the petitioner, including her placement in custody, pending a decision on the petition itself. “
Agmon Gonen reprimands the country on one side
In fact, Agmon Gonen issued an order based on her gut feeling, based on the poet Shimborska and with no clear mention in any form of two Supreme Court decisions. To make sure the state would not be able to deport the woman who entered, she gave her lawyer time to make the request to the Population Authority by the middle of next week and ordered the state to respond within two weeks.
Agmon Gonen also added that “the authority would do well to agree to the provision of temporary relief in these circumstances, and not only to the applicant.”
In other words, Agmon Gonen reprimands the country, on one side, without hearing the state’s position and considerations at all – because it must concede to the stay of every Ukrainian citizen who lands in Israel and allows him to stay in Israel until the end of the war.
A joke unfolding in the corridors of the Supreme Court tells of a lawyer who opens his appeal by saying that he is appealing the ruling of Judge Michal Agmon Gonen. The panel of judges asks him in response: “Okay, and what are the other reasons?”. Agmon Gonen bought her name as someone who is not afraid to rule against the Kabbalist, sometimes without reference to the law and sometimes also contrary to the explicit ruling of the courts above it.
This time Agmon Gonen broke her own record. In a momentary decision, without any legal justification and in the presence of one party without understanding or attempting to understand the systemic considerations of the Ministry of the Interior, Agmon Gonen repealed the entire policy of the Ministry of the Interior for the absorption of Ukrainian citizens. As for Agmon Gonen, every Ukrainian who arrives, even if he has infiltrated Israel in the past, even if he is refused entry to Israel, even if he does not meet any criteria – is entitled to continue staying in Israel, even if he came from Brussels and there Israel wants to return him.
In my opinion this is legal bullying worthy of all derogatory. Agmon Gonen is bullying her job force. This is judicial bullying. In fact, this is an opinion column that was mistakenly written on official stationery stationery.