Justice Minister Yariv Levin revealed that a Supreme Court judge demanded that he submit to the judiciary in a dispute and even threatened that he’d be publicly discredited if he refused.

Levin made the remarks during a conversation in the Knesset with students from the “National Vision” organization.

According to a report published Wednesday evening on Kan News, Levin recounted that one of his meetings with a Supreme Court justice focused, among other issues, on the appointment of the Ombudsman for Complaints Against Judges.

Levin said the justice mentioned the name of a former Supreme Court justice and told him that this was the candidate the judges wanted appointed to the position. The justice warned that if Levin did not approve their candidate, no ombudsman would be appointed at all—and the public would ultimately blame Levin for the absence of an official to handle complaints against judges.

“About a year and a half ago, I was invited to a meeting with one of the Supreme Court justices,” Levin told the students. “He said to me, ‘I have a proposal for you—I suggest that you give in.’ He said, ‘We have three points of dispute. You have no leverage and no alternatives, so it’s better for you to give in now rather than reach the same outcome later—only after suffering public and other kinds of damage.’”

Levin said that following this exchange, he approached MK Simcha Rothman with a proposal to change the method for selecting the Ombudsman for Complaints Against Judges. “After a very difficult struggle that took us more than a year, we passed a law and changed the method of selecting the ombudsman,” he said.

In March of last year, the Knesset approved the bill in its second and third readings, despite strong opposition from the Attorney General and the courts.

Under the new law, the ombudsman is chosen by a committee consisting of the Justice Minister, the Labor Minister, a Knesset member, a retired Supreme Court justice selected by the Supreme Court justices, a retired District Court judge chosen by the presidents of the district courts, a retired rabbinical judge chosen by the Chief Rabbis, and the National Public Defender.

Two months after the law’s passage, Judge Asher Kula was appointed as the new Ombudsman for Complaints Against Judges.

Prior to the new law, the ombudsman was selected by the Judicial Selection Committee based on a joint proposal by the Justice Minister and the President of the Supreme Court, who held veto power over the appointment. “This led to the appointment of ombudsmen who were former Supreme Court justices and close associates of sitting judges, raising serious concerns about conflicts of interest,” Levin said.

(YWN Israel Desk—Jerusalem)