Judicial appointments committee will convene with or without Levin, Lapid says

The judicial appointments committee will convene whether or not Justice Minister Yariv Levin respects Sunday’s High Court of Justice order to launch within two weeks the process to appoint a permanent Chief Justice, opposition head MK Yair Lapid said in his weekly press conference on Monday.

The justice minister has the legal prerogative to set the committee’s meetings and agenda, but Lapid said that if Levin refused to respect the High Court decision, he would act so that the committee convened regardless. However, this would amount to a “constitutional crisis” and an “assassination of Israeli democracy,” and it “must not happen,” the opposition leader said.

Lapid also said that he would oppose any attempts to amend the law to change the chief justice’s appointment process.

Court ruling 

The High Court ruled on Sunday that Levin must publish within 14 days the list of candidates for chief justice, and immediately afterward convene the committee for it to elect one of the candidates.

The ruling partially accepted the petition, which was filed by the Movement for Quality Government in Israel. The court accepted the claim that Levin had to appoint a chief justice, but did not accept the petition to force Levin to convene the committee to fill the two – and soon to be three – vacancies on the High Court bench.

Levin responded by harshly criticizing the decision. However, he stopped short of saying he would not respect the ruling. However, Levin said that he would not cooperate with a chief justice he said was appointed “illegally.”