Attorney General of Israel - Appointment

Appointment

In 1997 a commission in the chairmanship of the former president of the Israeli supreme court, Meir Shamgar, had been established for examination of the possibilities of the future legislation on the subject of the attorney general, and recommended that the official title of his or her position will be changed from "the legal adviser to the government" to "the chief legal adviser" to reflect his responsibility for ensuring the rule of law in all of the arms of government, and not only as an adviser to the government itself in matters of law. Likewise the commission recommended that the adviser will be appointed by the government according to the recommendations of a public commission, that will include five members: a retired judge of the supreme court, a former justice minister or attorney general, a Knesset member who will be chosen by the Constitutional Affairs committee of the Knesset, an attorney who will be chosen by the national council of the Israel Bar Association, and a legal expert in the subjects of civil and criminal law who will be chosen by the heads of the university law schools in Israel — in order to ensure the choosing of an appropriate person who possesses the fitting qualifications for the job. This recommendation regarding the selection committee was adopted in August 2000, but the recommendation regarding the title of the position was not adopted.

It is customary that the decision whom to select for the legal adviser position out of the list of nominees that the public commission recommended is done by the justice minister whose selection is brought to the approval of the government, which usually approves the appointment.

The manner in which the Attorney General carries out the duties assigned to his or her position is derived to a large extent from the personality of the person holding the position. Two of the legal advisers, Aharon Barak and Yitzhak Zamir, who came to the position from academia, were distinguished in the decisiveness that they demonstrated for the guarding of the rule of law in Israel, even when their ideas conflicted with those of the government.