Supreme Court to hear today the law freezing arrests of Haredi deserters
Five petitions were filed against the amendment to the Security Service Law passed by the coalition, which freezes criminal enforcement against Haredi deserters. The Attorney General and the Knesset's legal counsel believe the legislation should be cancelled, and the Supreme Court has already ordered a freeze on its entry into force until a decision is reached.
Nine Supreme Court justices will hear this morning (Tuesday) at 9:00 AM the petitions seeking to cancel the law that freezes criminal enforcement against Haredi deserters. The hearing will be broadcast live.
Five petitions were filed against the amendment to the Security Service Law, which was approved this month in the Knesset and freezes all criminal enforcement procedures against Haredi deserters, including arrests and interrogations. Shortly after the petitions were filed, the Supreme Court issued an interim injunction that halted the law from taking effect.
The Attorney General also believes that the law should be cancelled, while the Knesset's legal counsel determined that the legislative process contained fundamental flaws.
The petitions were filed by the Yesh Atid faction and its chairman Yair Lapid; the Movement for Quality Government; the Yisrael Beiteinu party and its chairman Avigdor Lieberman; the Brothers and Sisters in Arms organization; and the Israel Hofshit movement. According to the petitioners, the law violates the principle of equality and creates unacceptable discrimination.
It is argued that this is an unprecedented arrangement, under which "the state grants legal protection to those who violate the Security Service Law, and creates two types of deserters - a Haredi deserter who receives legal protection, and a secular deserter who continues to be arrested. Discrimination between blood and blood, in black and white."
Advocate Tomer Naor, Deputy Director of Strategy and Law at the Movement for Quality Government, one of the petitioners, stated:
"While our brothers and sisters, our sons and daughters are on the northern border, in Syria, in the Gaza Strip, in Judea and Samaria and the Jordan Valley, after three years of exhausting fighting, seeing their businesses collapse, their families falling apart, paying with their bodies and souls, and sometimes with their lives, what the Knesset members in the coalition chose to do is to raise their hands in favor of a law that protects Haredi draft dodgers, deserters, and criminals from the rule of law."
