Manof, the Center for Chareidi Information, quoted a long list
of former judges, writers, professors, politicians, and
lawyers criticizing the interventionism of the court,
especially in its capacity as High Court of Justice.
Moshe Landau, former president of the High Court, said, "What
kind of democracy is it to give the task of reviewing
decisions that were taken democratically [by the Knesset] to
an oligarchic group like the High Court?" (Ha'aretz,
October 10, 1997)
Nachum Barnea, a columnist for Yediot Acharonot wrote,
"The State of Israel is not a democracy, it is a
bagatzcracy." [Bagatz = Beis Din Govoha Letzedek, the
High Court of Justice]
Attorney Gidi Frishtik wrote in Hatsofe (August 18,
1995): "I looked through all of the decisions written by
Barak . . . and I did not find, in all those hundreds of
pages, even one quotation from a Jewish source. I did find
citations and precedents taken from sources in America,
Britain, Australia, Germany and India . . ."
There were also very pointed remarks directed at Aharon Barak
personally. "The approach of Barak is a danger to the basis
of democracy," wrote former Israeli President Chaim Herzog in
his book Derech Chaim. The late Prime Minister Yitzchak
Rabin wrote, "My faith in Aharon Barak was undermined. He
acted under the pressure of public opinion . . . He seeks to
present an image as free from influences, but in fact he
caves in to the pressure of public fashion" (from his
autobiography Pinkas Sherut).
In a sheet they handed out at the atzeres, Manof also
lists anti-chareidi rulings of the court in the past year.
They include the following:
* against withdrawing a kashrus certificate from a hall which
has a Xmas tree;
* against cancelling the kashrus certificate of a hall which
has a New Year's Eve party;
* against the deferment of yeshiva students from military
service;
* for a Meretz petition to stop the Jerusalem Religious
Council from setting its budget for next year;
* for secular burial;
* to accept a woman in a course for men, given by the
Employment Service;
* to force Religious Affairs Minister Eli Suissa to sign
appointments of Reform and Conservative members to the
religious councils;
* against the expulsion of a woman who is half-Jewish;
* to return a girl to a secular school after her father
withdrew her;
* against political activity by town and moshav rabbis;
* a neutral stand on whether one must wear a kippa in a
rabbinical court;
* for registering a Reform conversion;
* allowing an antisemitic campaign to encourage secular
voters in Yerushalayim;
* against allowing the distribution of oil blessed by a rabbi
to voters;
* in favor of including Reform and Conservative
representatives on religious councils (2);
* in favor of holding exams for women pleaders in rabbinical
courts;
* against double subsidies for Bnei Akiva.
* against political activities of state rabbis.
Altogether the list comprised 19 decisions of the High Court
in the last six months of 1998, of which the High Court ruled
against the religious position in 18. Twelve of these were in
the month of December alone, giving the feeling of increasing
momentum.
Other court rulings include rejecting a petition to allocate
scarce special gas masks to wearers of beards, rejecting a
petition calling to end discrimination against chareidim in
subsidies, removing former Sephardi chief rabbi Rav Ovadia
Yosef from his post on the Rabbinical Court of Appeals,
allowing television broadcasts on Shabbos, rejecting the
petition of a chareidi school in the Jerusalem quarter of
Ramot to occupy vacant space in a community center, and
extending the remand of a religious youngster for a month,
although he was not charged.
The center also listed a series of court decisions negating
the rulings of rabbinical courts in matters of marriage and
divorce, division of property, and custody, and that a common-
law wife may use her husband's name
Manof quoted legal scholar and journalist Ben Dror Yemini as
writing, "As far as equal access, for example, the High Court
is very wise about what the Netanya religious council should
do, but much less wise about itself . . . in Barak's opinion
there is no need for equality in the High Court."
(Ha'aretz, October 1, 1997)
The sheet listed the backgrounds of the High Court justices.
Twelve of the 14 justices are Ashkenazi, and 11 are male.
Thirteen are secular and the fourteenth is a very close
associate of Barak's whose background is only in academia.
All of them studied at the Hebrew University law faculty.
