An idea exists in every liberal democratic regime that power corrupts, and the powerful cannot be trusted to hold themselves in check. Therefore, checks and balances must be built into the system of government. Various democracies are guided by an identical principle: the division of power among three different branches of government to prevent any one entity from gathering too much power.
Theoretically, this principle should be familiar to us from civics lessons. But in a time when media outlets bombard us with claims of "dangerous legislation"; when corruption scandals hijack the public agenda; when hundreds of journalists make careers out of criticizing the Knesset and the government – the same media are demonstrating a dangerous blindness to the looming dangers to our freedom from law enforcement and the judicial branch.
In Israel, there is no balance of power between the branches of government. Note the number of systems actively working to keep the Knesset and the government from exploiting their power: The public can have Knesset members replaced; the High Court has the authority to repeal enacted laws or actions taken by the government; instructions from the attorney general have turned from recommendations into orders; the attorney general is also the state prosecutor and can order investigations against MKs and government ministers and put them on trial; the battle against corruption has become the police's top priority; the state comptroller is mostly busy criticizing the government; and of course, the media and NGOs are always looking around to discover what the government and legislators have done wrong.
But what systems of oversight exist to prevent officials in the justice system or the police from exploiting their own power? Are there any strong, independent institutions that have a prerogative to expose problems in the activity of officials in the Investigations and Intelligence Branch of the Israel Police or in the State Attorney's Office?
The answer should make us all uncomfortable. There are no institutions in Israel that have any "teeth." The Israel Police can arrest and interrogate Israeli citizens, obstructing their freedom; the State Attorney's Office can serve absurd indictments that ignore some pieces of evidence and emphasize others; the investigative unit and the State Attorney's Office can set their own, independent agenda and invest enormous amounts in secret investigations while ignore much worse scandals; serious cases involving judges or officials from the prosecution vanish without being investigated.
True, there are two entities that are supposed to provide institutional oversight: the police's internal investigations department and the Commission for Prosecutorial Oversight. But their work is laughable. About two weeks ago, it came to light that the new head of internal investigations in the police, Keren Bar Menachem, had said in closed-door discussions that the role of her new department was to serve the police force. Meanwhile, the commission's authority has been severely curtailed as a result of a strike by prosecutors. The "gatekeepers" who wage war on Knesset members and cabinet ministers have bullied their way into preventing even minimal oversight of their own actions.
We are left with only one mechanism: parliamentary oversight of Knesset committees. But there, too, things are bad. In the U.S., members of Congress have the authority to summon and question witnesses and request copies of protocols, email correspondence, and schedules of meetings. Failure to cooperate is considered a crime. On the other hand, even if MKs have the authority on paper to demand answers from civil servants like the state attorney or the police commissioner, the subjects of their criticism can thumb their noses at them.
Only last week, the attorney general instructed officials from the State Prosecutor's office and the Israel Police not to show up for a discussion in the Knesset House Committee on the matter of the investigations against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu being tainted. This is an example of the most serious threat to democratic rule in Israel today: the lack of appropriate checks and balances on hugely powerful government entities.
The $64,000 question is who will keep an eye on the gatekeepers? As of today, the answer is no one. We are supposed to have blind faith in the most powerful government bodies in any modern state, in institutions that threaten our freedom and run roughshod not only over law and justice, but also our political liberty and our sovereignty. We need to fix this.
