High Court Dismisses Otzma Yehudit Disqualification Petition (Updated)
Updates
- October 4, 2026: The High Court dismissed the Democrats’ petition to disqualify Otzma Yehudit or Itamar Ben-Gvir and Tally Gotliv, citing failure to follow the statutory appeal procedure and late filing. The ruling did not decide the underlying allegations on their merits.
Original report
The Central Elections Committee, chaired by Supreme Court Justice Noam Sohlberg, on September 24 rejected requests to disqualify Itamar Ben-Gvir's Otzma Yehudit from running in the upcoming Knesset election. Ten members voted for disqualification, 19 against and one abstained. The Democrats and the Zulat Institute had argued that the party negates Israel's existence as a Jewish and democratic state and incites to racism. Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara opposed disqualification, calling the evidence "very troubling" and saying it brought the list very close to the forbidden zone, but finding no "critical mass" of evidence meeting the strict bar set by Supreme Court rulings.
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