Two right-wing Knesset members were elected to the committee tasked with judicial appointments in a hard-fought early morning vote Thursday, July 23, after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reached an agreement with “opposition” racist MK Avigdor Liberman. MK Nurit Koren (Likud) and MK Robert Ilatov (Yisrael Beytenu) were elected to the powerful panel, after having received 69 and 67 votes respectively.
Hours after the vote, Ilatov told Army Radio he would not appoint any judge who refuses to sing the Hatikvah national anthem. “In my view, a judge who is unwilling to sing ‘Hatikva’ cannot be a judge in Israel, which is the nation state of the Jewish people,” Ilatov said. “I have no problem with those who have already been appointed to the bench. I will not appoint someone who on principle is opposed to the idea of the State of Israel as a Jewish state. I don’t need to aid and abet this.”
Supreme Court Judge Salim Joubran (left) not singing “Hatikvah” (Photo: Channel 2 News)
In 2012, Supreme Court Judge Salim Joubran, who is Arab, drew criticism after not singing the anthem, which tells of a “Jewish desire to return to the Land of Israel,” at an official ceremony. After the incident, then-MK David Rotem, from the Yisrael Beytenu party, asked to have Joubran removed.
The Judicial Appointments Committee is headed by Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked and rounded out by a minister, two other Knesset members, and two legal representatives. Since all judicial appointments require the approval of seven out of the nine members of the committee, Shaked, Koren, and Ilatov can effectively form a right-wing bloc to create a veto. The next round of judicial appointments for the Supreme Court is scheduled to be held in 2017, at which point the make-up of the current coalition may have changed.
Hadash MK Yousef Jabareen (Joint List) told journalists “Hatikva is an exclusively Jewish anthem and the State of Israel has failed over the years to adopt an anthem for all its citizens.” Jabareen emphasized that statements such as Ilatov’s prejudice the right of Arab jurists to be equal partners in the process of selecting judges and that Hatikva should be kept outside of this process. The Hadash MK added that there is a need to increase the number of Arab judges in Israel because they are underrepresented. Ilatov’s statement, he said, reflects “a dangerous attitude for the Israeli legal system in general, and for the process of selecting judges in particular.” Ilatov’s statement “comes from a party that is not committed to democracy, and nourished from racism and criminal behavior” said and added “The McCarthyism and infantile nature of Yisrael Beytenu reaches new heights with every passing day.”
Hadash MP Aida Touma-Sleiman (Joint List), told The Independent: “This is Ilatov’s way of saying clearly that he won’t support the appointment of any Arab judge. “Instead of saying that he’s looking to appoint professional judges who want to protect justice and democracy he is looking for reasons to discriminate against Arabs who would be suitable professionals and be able to be good judges. This was not an isolated declaration but a manifestation of a way of thinking and a policy driven by racist approaches,” she said. “Lately we have heard ministers and vice ministers saying even worse things than this.”
