Israeli lawmakers called for Supreme Court Justice Yitzhak Amit to be investigated on allegations of fraud following reports on Monday that he failed to disclose that he was involved in legal proceedings under a different name, which they said amounted to a conflict of interest.
Amit, who has been acting president of the Supreme Court since Oct. 1 and is a leading candidate to assume the post on a permanent basis, “cannot be president of the High Court of Justice—he cannot be a judge at all,” Likud Party lawmaker Tally Gotliv said.
“This man is, at the very least, an apparent fraud,” continued Gotliv, who called on Justice Minister Yariv Levin to recommend Amit’s resignation.
Likud legislator Moshe Saada, a former deputy chief of the Department of Internal Police Investigations, also urged Levin to inform the Judicial Selection Committee of what he described as suspicions of “criminal offenses” by Amit.
“There is reasonable suspicion here that the criminal offense of breach of trust has been committed,” Saada told Channel 14 News on Monday. “If a police patrolman had committed a similar offense of conflict of interest, he would not even have been appointed shift leader. All the more so when it comes to a candidate for the court presidency.”
MK Simcha Rothman (Religious Zionism Party), who chairs the Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee, said Amit “is unworthy of the position of president of the Supreme Court and the Judicial Selection Committee.”
“If Justice [Noam] Solberg or Justice Daphne Barak-Erez still have any respect for the institution in which they sit, they should announce that they will not cooperate with such an appointment,” Rothman said.
Opposition Knesset member Meirav Cohen (Yesh Atid Party) told the Ynet news outlet that if there are “ethical and legal problems” with Amit’s appointment, they “should be addressed with all seriousness.”
The calls for an investigation followed a Ynet report that Amit failed to inform the Judicial Authority that he was a party to legal proceedings concerning a property he owned together with his brother in Tel Aviv.
The judge reportedly appeared in the cases under his former last name, Goldfreind. The report said Amit also heard Supreme Court cases filed by a law office that was representing him in one of the civil suits, and was part of a selection committee that considered the promotion of another judge who presided over a case regarding the property.
In 2019, the Tel Aviv Municipality was said to have filed for a criminal indictment against the apartment’s owners, including Amit, due to safety concerns at the property. The charges were later dropped.
According to Ynet, Amit failed to report his personal cases since 2019. He also did not report the names of the attorneys representing him.
The Israeli Judicial Authority—the organization that encompasses the court system—defended Amit, saying he “became aware of the proceedings only following the submission of the query [by Ynet].” The justice “was unaware of any connection between them and the judges or lawyers mentioned,” the body added in a statement.
The Judicial Authority alleged that Amit’s brother was granted a power of attorney to handle the proceedings and signed the files in his place.
The Supreme Court, sitting as the High Court of Justice, on Dec. 12 ordered the government to call a vote in the Judicial Selection Committee for a new president of the court by Jan. 16.
Amit became acting president in October, taking over from retiring acting president Uzi Vogelman, who himself got the top legal job after the retirement of former court chief Esther Hayut in October 2023. The latter two stepped down at the mandatory retirement age for judges of 70.
The government led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu opposes the custom whereby the most senior judge is automatically promoted to court president, and to Amit, who is widely considered a left-wing judge.
On Thursday, Levin and Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar presented a pared-down judicial reform proposal. The plan addresses two issues: 1) the way judges are selected, and 2) Basic Laws, which are quasi-constitutional in nature. The proposal would only go into effect after a national election is held.
Those in favor of changes, such as Levin, who leads the reform effort on behalf of the government, say the current system is self-selecting, putting judges in charge of choosing their successors.