Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will begin interviewing candidates for the position of head of the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency), after High Court Justice Gila Kanfi-Steinitz wrote on Tuesday that she “did not see the need” to expand a temporary injunction freezing the firing of current head Ronen Bar such that it included a prohibition to interview new candidates.
Kanfi-Steinitz, in effect, rejected the position of Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara, according to which the prime minister could not take any action that could affect Bar’s status, including interviews of new candidates. Kanfi-Steinitz, however, accepted a request by the attorney-general to delay until April 8 the deadline for her response to the petitioners’ request for an interim injunction.
In a court filing on Monday, attorneys from the State Attorney’s Office, who answer to the attorney-general, requested the delay due to the “complexity, precedential, and importance” of the matter.
The attorneys stated that they needed to examine the government’s considerations, as well as the question of whether or not the prime minister was authorized to bring the decision forward due to a conflict of interest.
However, the attorneys wrote that it was already clear at this point that the firing process had included fundamental procedural flaws, as it did not meet basic administrative standards of facts, lacked an arraignment, and had a potential conflict of interest.
In addition, the implications of the firing “go far beyond the personal matter of the head of the Shin Bet; the decision has a broad and long-term impact on the perception of the roles of senior officials in the civil service and security bodies who exercise powers under the law, including powers that are particularly harmful,” the attorneys wrote.
In a court filing of his own on Monday, Netanyahu argued that a High Court ruling canceling the government’s decision to fire Bar would expropriate the government’s “authority, duty, and responsibility as the executive branch for the security of the State of Israel and its citizens.”
The filing was a joint response by Netanyahu and the government as a whole, represented by Adv. Zion Amir, to a demand by the petitioners that the court issue an interim injunction to block the firing. The court on Friday issued a temporary injunction so as not to create an “irrevocable” situation if the government moves forward to appoint a new Shin Bet head
PM claims 'authority lies solely with the government'
According to the prime minister and the government, the authority to dismiss the head of the Shin Bet lay solely with the government, according to the law. The government unanimously decided to dismiss Bar, and since the government’s responsibility for the Shin Bet is part of its responsibility for the state’s security, the issue was nonjusticiable.
Netanyahu also argued that the petitioners, which included a series of NGOs, political parties, and private citizens, were not directly affected by the decision and therefore did not have a right to appear in a court. Bar himself, the affected party, did not appeal the decision in court, the prime minister pointed out.
He also quoted then-deputy attorney-general Meni Mazuz as saying during preparation of the Shin Bet Law that “a head of service cannot serve if he does not enjoy the government’s trust.” It was therefore “impossible to force the prime minister and the government to continue working with a head of the Shin Bet who does not enjoy their trust,” Netanyahu argued.
The prime minister also argued that there was “no basis” for the claim that the decision to remove Bar was related to investigations into ties between Qatar and three of Netanyahu’s current or previous advisers. According to him, the “chronological order” of events proved that the Qatar investigation came after it had already been made clear that Bar would be fired after presenting the results of an internal investigation into the Shin Bet’s failure to block the Hamas October 7 massacre.
Finally, Netanyahu argued that a letter from Bar in which he accused the prime minister of firing him on “absurd allegations” and for “nonprofessional reasons” served effectively as a resignation letter.
Baharav-Miara approved the prime minister and government’s private representation, due to the fact that she believed the firing of Bar had been illegal.