Supreme Court President Isaac Amit on Tuesday recommended that Democrats chairman Yair Golan withdraw his petition seeking an order requiring the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) to protect him ahead of the October 27 election.
Amit made the recommendation during a hearing before a panel that also included Justices Ofer Grosskopf and Ruth Ronnen, after the justices heard Shin Bet representatives behind closed doors without Golan’s side present.
Attorney Omri Segev, representing Golan and the party, asked the state and the Shin Bet to update him on the security arrangements that could be offered to Golan.
Amit said the issue was “significant” and that the justices “were and remain concerned” about it. He said the panel understood that the Shin Bet would guide police in accordance with information provided by Golan’s team.
“We have a professional body that specializes in this matter, and we will not intervene,” Amit said, before recommending that the petition be withdrawn.
Golan faces death threats, threats to family
The justices made a distinction between the threat to Golan’s personal safety and disruptions to campaign events. Amit asked whether the Shin Bet was responsible for preventing an election meeting from being disrupted, while Grosskopf said public-order issues were the responsibility of police, not the Shin Bet.
The court did not issue a ruling on Tuesday. Amit instructed state prosecutors to mediate between the relevant bodies and told the parties to submit an update. “It is sad that we have reached such a situation regarding the security of candidates,” he said.
According to the petition, police informed Golan’s office about a month before it was filed that the threat level against him had been raised to four on a six-point scale.
The Democrats said Golan’s threat level was the same as that assigned to former IDF chief Gadi Eisenkot and claimed that protection had already been approved for Eisenkot. Eisenkot’s party disputed that account on Tuesday, saying it had been informed that the Shin Bet currently had no intention of providing him with security, despite the position of an advisory committee. Eisenkot’s team also confirmed this directly to The Jerusalem Post.
The petition documents dozens of threats posted between July and late September, including calls for Golan to be shot or hanged and messages threatening members of his family.
It also says Golan’s name appeared in a death-threat letter attached to a brick thrown at Channel 12’s studios on July 27. According to the petition, he was the only party leader named as a target in the letter.
The state told the court last week that the Shin Bet had begun implementing a broader security framework for party leaders under a classified September 16 decision by the Ministerial Committee for Shin Bet Affairs.
Under the arrangements, Shin Bet intelligence units monitor threats, coordinate with privately hired security teams and conduct periodic threat assessments. Party leaders may employ armed private guards, but the framework does not commit the agency to providing Golan with a direct Shin Bet protection detail.
Absence of protection impaired Golan's campaign
Under the arrangements, Shin Bet intelligence units monitor threats, coordinate with privately hired security teams and conduct periodic threat assessments. Party leaders may employ armed private guards, but the framework does not commit the agency to providing Golan with a direct Shin Bet protection detail.
State attorney Ran Rosenberg told the court that Golan had a dedicated Shin Bet contact from the agency’s Personal Security Unit who could help coordinate security measures with police as circumstances changed. He said the authorities had not initially received a request to authorize weapons for Golan’s private security company and that the request was forwarded to the Shin Bet once it was received.
Segev said that, with three weeks remaining before the election, the lack of state protection materially impaired Golan’s ability to campaign and the conduct of equal elections because threats and security warnings led to events involving him being changed or canceled.
Segev said spontaneous appearances exposed Golan to the risk of an opportunistic attack, while events announced in advance presented the different risk of a planned attack. At public appearances, he said, party volunteers sometimes formed a barrier between Golan and the crowd and were themselves struck, including at events coordinated with police.
He argued that the Shin Bet Law requires the agency to protect Israel’s democratic system and institutions and that the government had delegated to Shin Bet Director David Zini the authority to determine the security arrangements for party leaders.
Pressed by Ronnen on what precisely the Shin Bet should do, Segev acknowledged that preventing organized disruptions was not the agency’s responsibility. He argued, however, that the Shin Bet must ensure its protection arrangements do not leave one candidate unable to meet voters and campaign effectively.
“Yair Golan is under threat. That is the reality we are living in. This is the ‘threat from within,’” Democrats director-general Omer Lubaton Granot said, accusing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and those around him of conducting an incitement campaign that endangered Golan’s life.
“November 1995 must be a warning sign to all of us,” he said, referring to the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin