Israel's communications law suspended as High Court examines legal challenges

In September, Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara asked the High Court of Justice to freeze the Broadcasting Law until it rules on 11 petitions challenging it.

The government must explain why the Broadcasting Law it passed this year should not be canceled following allegations of legislative defects, the High Court of Justice decided Thursday. 

The conditional order issued gives the government and the relevant ministers and committees until January 7, 2027, to file responses.

The hearing will be before an expanded panel of nine justices.

Attorney Yaniv Goldberg, head of the Economic Division at the Movement for Quality Government in Israel, highlighted the court's reasoning behind the freeze.

"The communications minister can announce that he will not cooperate with the proceedings, but he cannot exempt himself from the rule of law. The High Court of Justice is now demanding answers to allegations of flaws in the legislative process through which the law was advanced, while suspending its entry into force," he said.

"This is an important step forward in the petitions, including the Movement's petition, against a law that changes the rules of the game in the communications market.

"A proper legislative process is intended to ensure that decisions affecting the information available to every citizen are made transparently, following professional review and genuine debate. We will continue working to overturn the law and protect media independence and the public's right to receive information free from political control."

High Court suspends Israeli communications law

This comes after the law has been frozen multiple times.

Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara asked the High Court of Justice in September to freeze the Broadcasting Law until it rules on 11 petitions challenging it.

Serious failures throughout the legislative process make the petitions exceptionally strong, the court said.

Baharav-Miara told the court that key parts of the reform reached the Knesset without the required professional review and were pushed through a committee effectively controlled by Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi.

She said the law could now trigger business and ownership changes that would be difficult to reverse if the court later strikes it down.

In July, the court temporarily froze the provisions of the broadcasting reform that were meant to take effect that summer.

Notably, most of the reform is scheduled to enter into force two years after the law’s publication.

Under the law, the search committee would be chaired by the Communications Ministry director-general and include representatives of the Regulatory Authority, Finance Ministry, and Competition Authority, as well as an academic representative.

It would recommend candidates for six public positions on the new nine-member regulatory council, who would then be appointed by the communications minister. The council’s three remaining members would be civil servants representing the Communications Ministry and the relevant government regulators.

The Knesset passed the law by a 53-48 vote in July, completing one of Karhi’s central legislative initiatives shortly before the Knesset’s dissolution.