Jonathan Zindel, Flash 90
One of the first laws that the future coalition plans to pass is the Deri law, the one that will allow Shas MK Aryeh Deri to be appointed as a minister – even though he was convicted of tax offenses less than a year ago and sentenced to a suspended prison sentence.
Today, the law prohibits appointing to the position of minister a person who has been sentenced to prison. According to Deri, the law does not refer to a suspended prison sentence, and therefore he can be appointed to the position of minister. Deri’s problem is that many jurists do not think as he does, and he knows that when petitions against his appointment are submitted to the High Court, an overwhelming majority of the chances state that the judges will reject his appointment as a minister in the government.
But don’t worry Derai, he already made it clear that he has a solution to the issue. During last October, Deri was a guest on “Meet the Press” on Channel 12, where he made it clear to Amit Segal and Ben Caspit that if the High Court prevents him from serving as a minister, the Knesset will reverse the ruling in legislation. If the legislation is canceled by the High Court, the Knesset will enact the The invalid law again through the superseding clause. How easy, that simple.
But today Deri understands that the High Court will disqualify him as a minister, so why does he have to go through the petitions? Deri has a shortcut: immediately after the passage of the enhancement clause, the Basic Law of the Government will be amended so that it is forbidden to appoint a minister only a person who has been sentenced to prison in practice. What is the immediate result? Deri, who was sentenced to prison Probationwill be able to serve as kosher.
The truth is that Deri wants the overcoming paragraph as an additional ‘protective layer’. In general, a superseding clause is intended for ordinary laws, and here we are talking about an amendment of a basic law that is in a higher normative status than an ordinary law. However, Deri remembers that in May 2021 the High Court of Justice ruled that in very exceptional cases basic laws can be invalidated. With the accumulation of data, which is too short to detail, Deri wants protection against the possibility that the High Court will invalidate the amendment to the legislation that would allow him to become a minister.
High Court judges are expected to disqualify the appointment of Aryeh Deri as minister (Yonathan Zindel/Flash90)
Personal legislation is invalid
Any person with eyes in his head knows how to identify personal legislation. The truth is, the right-wing camp knew how to do it in an excellent way when the outgoing government sought to enact the “Netanyahu Law” or the “Accused Law”. This law was supposed to prevent a person who was indicted from serving as prime minister. Who was the law aimed at? mystery. As if there is another person besides Netanyahu to whom this law is relevant.
Personal legislation is invalid, and against the basic principles of the democratic system. There is no dispute about that. The Knesset should enact general norms, and the government and the courts are the ones who should apply them individually.
The supporters of the law against Netanyahu claimed that it was not a personal law
Because of this, the supporters of the law against Netanyahu, tried to show that it was all about establishing a new norm and not legislation against Netanyahu personally.
The Attorney General at the time, Avichai Mandelblit, said that “the amendment is not personal but general, and forward-looking.”
Justice Minister Gideon Sa’ar said that “this is not a personal amendment. The laws will apply to everyone from the next Knesset and I don’t know where Mr. Netanyahu will stand. Maybe he will be acquitted by then? Maybe indictments will be filed against other people in the Knesset?”
The Chairman of the Constitutional Committee, Gilad Karib, said last June: “When they come and say that we will not remove a prime minister as soon as an indictment is filed against him, but that after elections, when the support of a group of parties is formed in imposing a position on a candidate, it will not be possible to impose the formation of the government on a candidate who is found In the midst of a criminal proceeding, and his party will honor itself and present another candidate, to come and claim that this is personal legislation is absurd.”
Netanyahu. “The defendant’s law” was brought against him personally (Sharia Diamant/Flash 90)
Likud knew how to recognize a personal law, when it was a law against Netanyahu
On the other hand, the opponents of the legislation knew very well the only direct victim of it – Netanyahu. Likud even defined the law as an “anti-democratic Iran-style law”.
Knesset member Amir Ohana called the law “an attack on democracy” and told Karib in the same debate last June: “What you are trying to do now is to deny the ability of those who receive the widest public support from running for the Knesset. You are not trying to create a principled norm that has not come into existence in 74 years the state, but they are trying to block a specific candidate.”
MK Yoav Kish said: “For a whole year you did not act on the issue because you knew it was a personal law, dangerous for democracy.” Miri Regev expanded and said that “this law is not the law of the accused. It’s a political assassination law against Bibi Netanyahu.”
Put aside the harsh words that Likud members chose to use. In my opinion, there is no doubt that the law prohibiting a criminal defendant from serving as prime minister was a personal law against Netanyahu, and it is good that it did not pass the Knesset.
Amir Ohana. Claimed that the law against Netanyahu is an “attack on democracy” (Oliver Pitosi/Flash 90)
Where did Likud’s claims against personnel legislation go?
But now the same opposition that overwhelmingly fought against the personal legislation against Netanyahu is about to become a coalition and is apparently about to enact a personal law in favor of Aryeh Deri.
It is hard not to see that the only direct beneficiary of the law that will allow those who have been given a suspended prison sentence to serve as minister is Aryeh Deri, just as it is hard to see that the only direct victim of the law that prohibits a person accused of crimes from serving as prime minister is Netanyahu.
Where did the claim that a personal law is dangerous for democracy go? When did the claim to the “assassination law” disappear – or in the case of the Deri law, the “training law”? Why did the claim that the law will apply to everyone equally, which was illegitimate when Gideon Sa’ar presented it, become legitimate in order to pass personal legislation for Aryeh Deri? Does the Likud no longer believe that these are Iran-style laws?
The Israeli legislature. Members of the Knesset were authorized by the people to determine the appropriate norms in their eyes (Hades Proosh/Flash 90)
The Knesset can determine the norms in the “Accused Law” and “Deri Law” without them being personal, but the coalition does not want to
I have said in the past, and I say now: the Knesset is authorized to determine which norm is correct in the eyes of the members of the Knesset. We are the ones who elected the legislators, and the democratic authority is in their hands. But, if you are interested in establishing a new norm and not personal legislation – what is the problem with applying the same norm from the moment the law is passed, and bringing it forward?
I suggested during the attempts to pass the “Accused Law” against Netanyahu, that if the establishment of the norm is the one that is important to the outgoing coalition that it be respected and establish in terms of legislation that the law will only apply to indictments filed after the law was passed. It is not for nothing that the outgoing coalition did not act in this way. The law was personally directed against Netanyahu.
I propose the same thing now: if it is important for the incoming coalition to establish a norm that only those who have been given a prison sentence in practice It will be forbidden to officiate as a minister, while the one who was imposed a prison sentence Probation It will be permissible to serve as a minister – the incoming coalition will be honored and announce that it will establish in a matter of legislation that the permit to serve as a minister for those convicted of a suspended sentence will only be from the day the law was passed, without retroactive application to those who were previously sentenced to prison. But the incoming coalition will not act like that, and you already know why. This law was personally tailored to the dimensions of Aryeh Deri.
Personal legislation is a forbidden thing. This is one of the basic principles of the democratic system. Whoever today works in favor of personal legislation in favor of Aryeh Deri, should not come with complaints if tomorrow the other side works in favor of personal legislation against Netanyahu.
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