The Supreme Court has ruled that as of Thursday, as the state seeks to extend the policy - Knesset legislation will be required • Last month, the Ministry of Health announced that due to the telephone collection, approximately 500 Corona patients were detected in Israel

• High Court hearing on phone pickup // Photo: Amit Shavi

Bg''tz held today (Sunday) that starting next Thursday, April 30, as the country seeks to continue to be assisted by technological means in the hands of interrogators to combat the spread of the virus, corona, this authority should be established in primary legislation.

However, as Siotna legislative procedure , The qualification decision can be extended for an additional short period not exceeding a few weeks to allow the completion of this procedure.

The Judges' Composition, chaired by Supreme Court President Hayes and taken by Justices Noam Solberg and Deputy Chief Justice Hanan Meltzer, today received petitions directed against the government's decision to authorize the General Security Service, with the approval of the Intelligence and Secret Services Subcommittee, to implement technological measures to monitor the nation's citizens and residents The fight against the spread of the Corona virus. It has been stated, as the State seeks to continue to assist the ISA after 30 April 2020, it will have to begin a process of primary legislation, which must be completed within a few weeks at most. 

The President of the Supreme Court insisted that the outbreak of the Corona epidemic and its spread led to a change in living arrangements in Israel and around the world and that under these unique and exceptional circumstances, the government was empowered by section 7 (b) (6) of the ISA law to make a decision to operate the ISA. This is to use his technological means to conduct epidemiological investigations designed to locate people who have come into close contact with authenticated patients and to inform them that they should enter home isolation.

The above section of the Shin Bet Law, it states, allows the government, with the approval of the Intelligence and Secret Services Subcommittee, to authorize the Shin Bet to carry out activities in the field that are not at the core of security activity in the narrow sense, which is necessary to safeguard and advance "essential national security interests." The state "and when there is grave and immediate danger to the citizens of the state and its inhabitants or to its regime.

The court further upheld a petition by the journalist organization against the use of GSS technological measures against journalists diagnosed with the Corona virus. Majority opinion (the president and the deputy president) insisted that freedom of the press and the protection of journalistic sources mattered in the days of a national crisis. 

Therefore, an outline was determined, which the journalists' organization agreed, according to which the list of journalists holding a journalist's certificate will be handed over to the Ministry of Health and a journalist diagnosed with the virus will be asked by the Ministry of Health to consent to the transfer of his details to the GSS. As stated, the mechanism will be operated as usual, He has a 24-hour stay to apply to the court and receive an order that will prevent the transfer of his details to the ISA.

At the same time, he will conduct a detailed epidemiological investigation and he will be asked to sign a declaration that he undertakes to inform himself of his journalistic sources, as he comes into contact with them in the 14 days preceding his diagnosis. This is to note that most conversations with sources are currently being made over the phone and do not involve physical encounters, and therefore the outline is not expected to cause any particular difficulty. This outline will apply from the date of the judgment. 

Judge Solberg, in a minority opinion, disapproved of this outline because it meant denying the right of those exposed to a sick journalist to be notified as soon as possible that they were exposed to the risk. This violation of their right to health, their own and their relatives, is unjustified. Justice Solberg noted that the right to life overcomes the far-reaching fear of violating press freedom. The outline proposed by the government can be satisfied that journalists diagnosed with the Corona virus will conduct a detailed epidemiological investigation in addition to an examination of the ISA's technological means, of which no results will be revealed.