Supreme Court President Dorit Beinisch announced the appointment of five new court presidents last week – four of them women. She also said that she would be broadening the authority of the court presidents. The appointments appear to tighten the feminist movement’s hold on the court system.
The new appointments were made possible by a reform instituted by Beinisch’s arch-foe, former Justice Minister Daniel Friedmann, who decided to limit the tenure of court presidents. As a result of the reform, five court presidencies were opened for new appointments.
Court presidents have the authority to decide which court will hear which case, and can determine which cases will be heard by a panel of three judges instead of just one judge. If the panel includes the president, then the president is its head, and his or her opinion carries more weight than the other judges.
Clockwise from top left: Judges Dotan, Berliner, Kedrai, Herman.
Beinisch's Choices
The court presidents who were appointed last week were, by and large, Beinisch’s choices, according to B'Sheva Magazine’s legal reporter Yair Shapira, and new Justice Minister Yaakov Ne’eman did not see fit to argue with her decisions. “And so, out of five appointments to court presidencies, four women were appointed and only one man,” writes Shapira.
Judge Devorah Berliner was appointed to head the Tel Aviv District Court. Berliner, who is religious, had been a leading candidate for the Supreme Court several years ago but Beinisch preferred Arbel over her at the time. Zivah Hadasi-Herman was appointed to head the Tel Aviv Magistrates Court. Shulamit Dotan was appointed to head the Jerusalem Magistrates Court, and Daphna Blattman-Kedrai is the new President of the Central District Magistrates Court.
Judge Georges Azoulai was appointed President of the Northern District.
Blattman-Kedrai is a relatively young judge, under the age of 50. Shapira hints that due to the fact that she is also the daughter of Yonah Blattman, under whom Beinisch served for many years, Beinisch should not have participated in her selection.
Judge Georges Azoulai
Leftist-Feminist Worldview
Beinisch is the first female Supreme Court President, and she subscribes to a leftist-feminist worldview, which centers on a perceived power struggle between female power and the male "patriarchy." Adherents of this worldview also see male aggressiveness (or "violence") as the cause of war, and believe that placing power in the hands of women will make for a peaceful world.
According to B'Sheva’s Shapira, the Justice Ministry began advancing women to key positions in the 70s. When Yonah Blattman retired as Chief Prosecutor in the mid-80s, “he left behind him a senior and dominant staff of female prosecutors,” writes Shapira. “The then-Deputy Chief Prosecutor Dorit Beinisch was appointed Chief Prosecutor. A few years later she was succeeded by her friend, Edna Arbel. By the time Arbel retired from that post, almost all of the senior positions in the Prosecution were taken up by women.”
About half of Israel’s judges are currently women, and women constitute a clear majority among Family Court judges. The Family Court system was instituted in the 1990s, under Supreme Court President Aharon Barak, as a secular counterbalance to the rabbinical courts' authority in divorce cases and other family matters.
Women Hold 66% of Senior Positions
According to information released recently for Women’s Day, 66 percent of the senior positions in the Justice Ministry – 633 out of 974 positions – are currently held by women. Of 37 Ministry employees ranked equal to district court judge, 22, or 59 percent, are women. The only two Ministry employees ranked equal to a Supreme Court judge are men: Menachem Mazuz, the Attorney General, and retired judge Eliezer Goldberg, the system’s ombudsman.
About 1,800 of the ministry’s total of 2,743 employees, or 65 percent, are women.
According to Shapira, the recent appointments mean that there will be several female Supreme Court Presidents in the next two decades.
Writing in a previous issue of B'Sheva, Rabbi Eliezer Melamed noted that laws that require the appointment of women to positions of power strengthen the secular left, because women from the religious right tend to be less career-oriented than those of the left.