Hiddush in the Legal Trenches:
Protecting the Rule of Law, Public Coffers and the Future of Israel
Hiddush filed a petition against the government's attempt to implement coalition agreements signed with the ultra-Orthodox parties
25/07/2024 14:21
Tags: ultra-Orthodox · coalition agreements · Hiddush
Everything is Matter of Priorities
Hiddush continues to play a leading role in the legal battle against some of the most severe wrongs and abuses promoted by the current government due to the unholy alliance between religion and politics.
The most significant case in terms of financial impact is the petition filed by Hiddush several months ago against the government's attempt to implement coalition agreements signed with the ultra-Orthodox parties. These agreements would add approximately 600 million shekels annually to the funding of the large educational networks of the United Torah Judaism and Shas parties, disguised as "New Horizon" and "Geffen" programs that are carried out in the public school system.
Our petition halted this move, which the Ministry of Education tried to advance without regard to the fact that it was done illegally and while ignoring the key requirements of these programs regarding core studies, teacher training, and participation in objective external exams of student achievements. Our petition is receiving extensive coverage in the Israeli media, who described it as a game changer. It also prompted the Attorney General and senior officials in the Ministry of Finance to get involved and demand transparency, oversight, and preconditions which had never been seriously required previously.
In light of these demands, and the attempt by the ultra-Orthodox educational networks to avoid committing to these requirements, the state has already requested eight (!) postponements to respond to our petition, and meanwhile, the payments of these large additions to the networks have been stopped. There is no doubt that our petition posed a tough challenge for the ultra-Orthodox parties, which had so far managed to overpower any objections by their political partners. They are learning that when faced with a legal barrier, it is not so easy to do so. This highlights the importance of the struggle against the judicial overhaul, which sought to emasculate the Supreme Court and weaken the legal gatekeepers in government ministries and explains why the ultra-Orthodox parties pushed the judicial overhaul and the neutralization of the Supreme Court so strongly.
Concurrently to the above-mentioned petition, hair-raising data on the hundreds of millions in debts of the ultra-Orthodox educational networks were published. Hiddush has approached the Attorney General, the police, the Registrar of Non-Profit Associations, and others, demanding a police investigation of the senior officials of these networks on suspicions of corruption and the misappropriation of hundreds of millions of shekels received from the state treasury. We have also demanded the dissolution of the Shas-affiliated Bnei Yosef school network based on an investigative accountant's opinion we received, that reviewed its financial reports and concluded that it is insolvent. In the coming days, we will make another demand to the Registrar of Non-Profit Associations and the Ministry of Finance asking that they appoint investigative accountants to examine the financial conduct of these networks in light of accumulating evidence of offenses and misuse of state funds. Additionally, we are calling to halt further involvement in matters pertaining to the Bnei Yosef network and the new public Haredi schools’ network by the minister appointed by the Shas party in the Ministry of Education. We demonstrate in our appeal that his conduct is prohibited due to conflict of interest.
Our petition posed a tough challenge for the ultra-Orthodox parties, which had so far managed to overpower any objections by their political partners
As mentioned, these abuses of funds and authority were known to government ministries for years, but they refrained from seriously acting to stop them. Recently, in an interview with a senior Treasury official (who for understandable reasons, was interviewed anonymously) he openly admitted the reason: "As long as Gafni is the chairman of the [Knesset] Finance Committee, any attempt to regulate the operations of the ultra-Orthodox shcools will lead to delays in approving other [national] budget transfers, and that is too high a price." We have already written several times about how MK Rabbi Gafni, leader of Degel HaTorah (the party representing the Ashkenazi yeshiva world), engages in extortion, exploiting his position as chairman of the Finance Committee. Now, this anonymous frank testimony from a Treasury official reaffirms our claims and explains why they did not bother to stop these abuses over the years.
This Hiddush legal initiative joins another one we have been litigating in the Supreme Court for about a year: Deri's Food Stamps. This concerns one billion shekels demanded by the Shas party in the coalition agreements, supposedly to promote food security. However, the way the first 400 million was distributed clearly showed that their primary interest was to cater to their constituency, and most of this money was allocated to ultra-Orthodox families, discriminating against other groups suffering from food insecurity and contrary to professional standards for promoting food security.
Our petition stopped the distribution of the additional 600 million, and the court ordered the formulation of new criteria for distributing the funds and to hold another hearing to examine these criteria. Almost a year has passed, but the state has repeatedly requested delays in this matter, as they have yet to formulate new criteria. This is undoubtedly because Shas realized that it will not be able to distribute them mainly to the ultra-Orthodox voters if they have to formulate them according to professional and legal principles. Unfortunately, it seems that since genuine concern for food security was not at the forefront of their minds, they lost their original zeal and interest in using these funds. Sadly, realizing that their constituency would not be the primary beneficiary of these funds as originally schemed, they even agreed to cut the amount in half (300 million shekels), something they did not do concerning other budget lines that are explicitly intended for ultra-Orthodox projects and programs.
In this petition, we continue to urge the Supreme Court not to accede to the state's requests for postponement, and we hope that soon the state will be forced to present the new criteria and subject them to the court's review as part of our petition. This will go a long way in ensuring that significant funds are truly allocated for the benefit of the underprivileged population in Israel that suffers food insecurity.
These are just a few examples of the many issues we are dealing with in the legal department. There is much work, and our staffing is limited. We would welcome additional assistance that would allow us to expand the legal department and increase the scope of our legal advocacy to advance religious freedom and equality.