President Yitzhak Amit:
- In a judgment in the petitions that are the subject of the additional hearing (High Court of Justice 37830-08-24 Louis Brandeis Institute for Society, Economics and Democracy, The College of Management Academic Track, founded by the Tel Aviv Bureaucratic Union v. Government of Israel [Nevo] (12.5.2025) (hereinafter: The Judgment in the Petitions or The judgment that is the subject of the additional hearing)), I emphasized that the government has the authority to appoint the Civil Service Commissioner (hereinafter also: The Commissioner) does not mean unlimited discretion. In this context, I emphasized that the law authorizing (Civil Service Law (Appointments), 5719-1959 (hereinafter: The Appointments Law or The Law)) It is intended to maintain the professionalism and stateliness of the public service, which is essentially apolitical, and to prevent appointments due to improper considerations. These rationales, as I noted, are sharpened in relation to the role of the commissioner, who is an independent gatekeeper who must act to seal the public service from the penetration of political considerations. I also noted various developments that have taken place over the years, on the factual and legal levels, which reinforce the importance of preserving the independence of officers whose independence is part of their role.
With regard to the appointment process that the government has set in our case, I noted, inter alia, that the process involves the decisive involvement of the political echelon, and of the prime minister in particular (in a way that is doubtful, to say the least, whether it is expected to yield the best candidate from a professional point of view); and that no orderly process of staff work or examination of alternatives to the chosen procedure was presented, and therefore doubt arises as to the existence of a sufficient factual basis for the chosen outline. Taking into account this, and against the background of the array of relevant considerations that the government was required to take into account in its decision - considerations that derive, inter alia, from the purpose of the authorizing law - I am of the opinion that there is a real doubt as to whether the determination of the appointment procedure was based solely on substantive considerations, and that there is justification for shifting the burden of proof on the matter to the government. Since the government was unable to meet this burden, I came to the conclusion that the procedure set by the government could not stand.