National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir filed an urgent request with the High Court on Sunday, accusing Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara’s office of trying to broaden last week’s interim ruling in the ongoing case over his involvement in police matters.
On Monday, Supreme Court President Isaac Amit gave the other parties until Thursday at 12 p.m. to respond, leaving the request pending for now.
Also on Sunday, the court received nine sealed copies of the framework at the center of last week’s hearing – the draft procedures submitted by the attorney-general under the High Court’s April 16 decision, after the justices gave binding force to that framework while ordering the sides to keep working out its final details.
Last week, a nine-justice panel stopped short of ordering Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to dismiss Ben-Gvir. However, they gave binding force to an existing framework meant to limit the minister’s role in policing. The court also imposed immediate restrictions touching on sensitive appointments, protest-related policing, investigations, and public remarks about police use of force.
In practical terms, the court left Ben-Gvir in office but made clear that he could not continue operating in police matters as before while the case remains pending.
It also ordered the sides back into talks over detailed procedures and left the petitions alive, in case the framework is violated again.
Court asks Ben-Gvir to clarify three main points
In his Sunday filing, Ben-Gvir asked the court to clarify three main points: who should lead the talks on the draft procedures, who must recommend certain top-tier police appointments, and when exactly the attorney-general is supposed to be notified about sensitive promotions.
On the first point, Ben-Gvir said, the attorney-general’s office moved too quickly after the ruling. According to his filing, Deputy Attorney-General Gil Limon notified the minister’s office that a working meeting on the draft procedures would be held on Monday under his leadership and without a representative from the Prime Minister’s Office.
Ben-Gvir argued that this ran against the court’s instruction that the prime minister, the minister, and the attorney-general confer in order to complete the work on the draft rules.
The national security minister said that he was willing to continue the talks, but insisted they should take place under the umbrella of a Prime Minister’s Office representative rather than be led by the attorney-general’s office alone.
The second dispute concerns police promotions. Last week, the court ruled that senior and sensitive law enforcement appointments to the rank of superintendent and above may move forward only on the recommendation of the police commissioner, with seven days’ advance notice to the attorney-general, who may state her position.
Ben-Gvir now wants the justices to clarify that those top-level appointments are treated differently.
His filing argues that under existing police and ministry procedures, they require the recommendation of the police commissioner, not the senior appointments forum referenced elsewhere in the case.
The third issue is timing. Ben-Gvir argued that the attorney-general is supposed to receive notice seven days before he signs off on a promotion, not earlier in the internal police process.
But in a Friday letter cited in his filing, Deputy attorneys-general Gil Limon and Sharon Afek instructed Police Commissioner Danny Levi that recommendations for senior and sensitive appointments be sent to the attorney-general’s office for review at least seven days before they are passed to Ben-Gvir’s bureau.
Ben-Gvir said that this interpretation effectively turns the attorney-general into a gatekeeper before recommendations even reach him, going beyond what the court actually ordered.
The latest fight is part of the broader High Court case over whether Ben-Gvir crossed the line between setting policy and interfering in police independence.
In last week’s ruling, the justices avoided the more dramatic step of ordering his dismissal, but they did tighten the limits on his conduct and place the case on a more closely supervised track.