Judicial Selection Committee to convene on Sunday for first time in a year and a half

The Judicial Selection Committee is set to convene on Sunday for the first time in a year and a half to deliberate on judicial appointments, following Justice Minister Yariv Levin’s 18-month refusal to convene the key panel.

The committee hearing will consider the appointment of judges to magistrates’ courts, traffic courts, and family courts in the northern and southern districts.

Levin has refused to convene the Judicial Selection Committee since January 2025, seemingly because he does not have a majority on the nine-member panel to ensure his preferred candidates get selected and because new legislation radically changing the judicial appointments process will come into effect after the upcoming election.

As a result, there are currently 51 vacancies on the country’s various magistrate and district courts, a number that will rise to 67 by the end of the year.

Due to legal pressure on Levin through petitions to the High Court, he published the names of judicial candidates for courts in the northern and southern district during the course of May, a key step before holding appointment hearings.

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On May 31, the High Court ordered Levin explicitly to “take the necessary steps” to appoint district court judges as well, specifying the Haifa and Beersheba district courts in particular where there is an acute lack of judges, and ordered him to publish candidates’ names by June 8.

Israel Courts Administration Director Judge Tzachi Ouziel, not Levin, then published a list of candidates for the Haifa and Beersheba District Courts in the state gazette on June 5.

The notice did not, however, give a date on which the nominees would be debated, unlike the hearings for candidates for courts in the northern and southern districts, where dates were given for the end of June.

The committee can only hold hearings on judicial nominees 45 days after their candidacies are published in the state gazette. The end of the 45-day period for the district court judges falls on July 20, extremely close to the likely final date for the dissolution of the Knesset, after which judicial appointments are very difficult.

Additionally, the government’s judicial appointments law, passed in March 2025, gives politicians from both the coalition and opposition veto power over lower court appointments. It will come into effect after the upcoming elections and could further complicate the judicial appointments process. The High Court is also reviewing that legislation, and appears poised to strike it down.

The High Court, in its ruling on May 31 ordering Levin to take steps to appoint district court judges, noted that in addition to the current judicial vacancies, the 2025 – 2026 state budget funded 35 new judicial positions, which have not been filled. It added that because promotions within the judiciary mean that replacements need to be found for those receiving promotions, the Judicial Selection Committee currently needs to fill some 150 judicial positions in all courts around the country.

The court in its ruling singled out the severe lack of judges on some district courts, noting that the Beersheba District Court is missing five out of 24 judges, or 21% of the bench. The Haifa District Court is currently missing three judges out of 35 positions, with another three judgeships set to be vacated by the end of the year, which would amount to 17% of the bench being vacant.

District courts have particular importance because they hear more serious crimes than magistrates’ courts and hear appeals from the lower courts as well.

“The burden created in the Israeli judicial system is exceptional and particularly heavy… the direct result of not appointing judges for such a long period is serious harm to the service that the judicial system is supposed to provide to the general public,” the High Court said in its May ruling.

Levin’s attorney argued in court that there was no longer enough time for the Judicial Selection Committee to do its due diligence over district court judge nominees before the Knesset is dissolved. The court accused him of having created the problem himself by refusing to convene the committee since January 2025.

“I’m a bit saddened by the fact that the minister is proposing a solution for a problem he himself created,” Justice Ofer Grosskopf said during the hearing.