New bill takes aim at leftist groups

Right-wing MKs launched a new attack against leftist organizations Monday with a bill limiting their right to petition the High Court of Justice.

MKs Danny Danon and Yariv Levin from the Likud Party explain that the bill, which is aimed at preventing court rulings from exacting influence in the name of organizations that have no direct connection to the matters at hand, government policy, or the Knesset.

The bill was proposed as an amendment to Basic Law: The Judiciary. It states that the High Court will only accept petitions making claims in the name of organizations based in Israel and operating mainly in the Jewish state.

It also states that just one petition at a time can be filed in the name of the injured party, and that it must be related to a fundamental infringement of basic state order, a fundamental flaw in the operations of the civil administration against the public, or any matter of an outstanding public nature.

The bill is expected to incur the wrath of international left-wing and human rights organizations, especially with one specific clause, which states that any organization petitioning the High Court will have to present the court with a list of all donations and funds it has received in the past three years. The organization will have to outline the identity of the donor as well as the sum and aim of the funds.

The new bill follows a failed proposal also offered up by Danon, which suggested the establishment of inquiry committees to probe the funding of left-wing organizations in Israel by foreign entities. The Knesset rejected this bill after it angered the groups that were to be probed.

"In recent years there has been much use of public petitions to the High Court of Justice against administration of government decisions," the MKs wrote in their explanation of the bill.

"These petitions, which sometimes caused a serious change in a decision or governmental action even to the point of causing them to be canceled, carry great weight and recognizably influence the actions of the executive and legislative branches."

Levin and Danon added that "when this information is made available to High Court justices they will be able to make sure that foreign causes supported by hostile groups cannot make their way into the court under the guise of public-interest petitions".

"For a number of years a de-legitimization campaign has been going on against the definition of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, and hostile groups have been trying to influence the authorities' actions under the guise of petitions in the name of the public good," they wrote.