Moshe Segal, Yaacov Aharoni, Mordechai Shachori, Avraham Steinberg, Avraham Elkayam, Israel Hanadi and many other good people, had at least two common denominators. They were proud Jews who also chose to risk their freedom in favor of blowing a shofar at the Kotel (the Western Wall). This was in the years before the establishment of the State of Israel, during the time of the British (Mandate) occupation, when the British were adamant about stifling any signs of Jewish nationality. Those who dared blow the shofar, who dared to practice their religious freedom at a remnant of the holiest site to Jews, were punished for this in various ways, from imprisonment to flogging.
Absurdly, many more names of Jews have been added to this list in recent weeks. A number of Jews chose to exercise their right to blow a shofar at the eastern wall of the Temple Mount during the ten days of Atonement this month of Elul, in the capital of their state, Jerusalem, the city to which generations of Jews prayed to return for thousands of years. They, like the shofar blowers during the time of the Mandate, were arrested, only that this time the shofar blowers were arrested not by the police of a foreign government but by the police of the State of Israel.
Despite the fact that the law allows Jews to blow the shofar there, the police chose time and time again to arrest the shofar blowers and bring them before the court with various and diverse claims, all of which were determined to be baseless by the court.
Time after time, the police were reprimanded by the court which ordered them to release the shofar blowers and, in some cases, even awarded the shofar blowers compensation. Yet, despite the reprimands from the court, Israeli policemen continued to arrest the shofar blowers day after day. These arrests were a blatant violation of the law by the Israel Police who used force in an illegal manner, disregarded the human rights of the accusers, disdained the court's decisions and the Israeli law.
One can only speculate as to what was behind the police officers' decision to break the law time and time again, but regardless of the reason, the Legal Forum concluded that there is a need to discuss the reality that an individual police officer does not have a reason to refrain from breaking the law. As we mentioned earlier, the court reprimanded the police officers, and in some cases awarded compensation to people who were falsely arrested for blowing the shofar, yet day after day, police officers continued to arrest shofar blowers .
As a general rule in civil cases, the possibility that the court will award compensation in favor of the aggrieved party acts as a deterrent to those who consider breaking the law. There are direct monetary consequences to the offending party. But when we talk about the Israel Police and civil servants in general, the party who broke the law, the individual police officer or civil servant, is not identical with the party who is required to pay compensation - the organization, or in other words, we, the citizens, by paying our taxes.
Currently, a police officer who breaks the law, but is supported by his commanders, has no incentive not to violate the law, and can continue to disregard the law and violate the rights of law-abiding citizens.
So, what can be done against a police officer who breaks the law? In order to deal with such a situation, the State of Israel established the Police Investigation Department, whose role is to investigate the performance of Israeli police officers. In reality, however, many cases were closed despite clear evidence of violations of the law by a police officer, and in most cases of the very small percentage of the complaints that were found to be justified by the unit, the offending officer was merely referred to a disciplinary hearing, which was conducted by the very organization where he works – the police department.
There is no doubt that the Department of Police Investigations needs a serious shake-up. Until then, the Legal Forum has offered another option - to amend the law so that in cases where a police officer deliberately acts in violation of the law and compensation to the aggrieved party is ordered by the court, the offending police officer will no longer be exempt from personal responsibility but will be required to pay the compensation out of his own pocket. This change will act as a serious deterrent to a police officer who will then think much more than twice whether to break the law. Of course, if the police officer received an order to break the law, then the commander will be personally charged.
Is this a revolutionary proposal? The answer is no, for a similar mechanism exists in Israeli corporate law. When it is proven that a shareholder acted deliberately in violation of the law, it is possible to request that the shareholder, and not the corporation, pay the damages from his own pocket. The Legal Forum’s proposal seeks to similarly establish a mechanism so that the individual public servant is no longer able to take advantage of the power that he has received from the state vis-a-vis the citizen, and shirk his individual responsibility for breaking the law.
Yotam Eyal is the director of The Legal Forum for Israel which dedicates itself to fight for justice, submits appeals and law proposals to correct the many faults in the current system, writes reports and articles for the media, gives lectures and publicizes the current situation. Its goal is to educate the public and the legislators as to their rights in a democracy. so that the will of the voters in Israel will once again be actualized and will not be rejected by the unelected judges and members of the judiciary..