The International Commission holds a panel discussion entitled: “Legal Reading in the President’s Decisions to Dissolve the Supreme Judiciary”
NO: 50/2019
Date: 1 Oct 2019
Press release
The International Commission holds a panel discussion entitled: “Legal Reading in the President’s Decisions to Dissolve the Supreme Judiciary”
Occupied Palestine / Gaza: The International Commission to Support Palestinians’ Rights (ICSPR) held a panel discussion entitled: “Legal Reading in the President’s Decisions to Dissolve the Supreme Judiciary”, at the Commission’s headquarters in Gaza, in the presence of a number of jurists, lawyers and academics.
Wissal Al-Tanani, a lawyer at the International Commission opened the meeting, welcoming the attendees, stressing that President Mahmoud Abbas’s decision to dissolve the Supreme Judicial Council and form a temporary council is unconstitutional and inconsistent with the Palestinian Basic Law.
During the meeting, the participants emphasized the urgent need to hold legislative and constitutional elections, and pointed out that the claim that the Palestinian political division justified the dissolution of the Supreme Judicial Council is a false argument.
They also explained that the judges of the Constitutional Court themselves are over sixty years old, and that the new Transitional Higher Judicial Council, headed by Counselor Abu Sharar, is over 75 years old, and this contradicts the amendment by lowering the retirement age of judges from seventy to sixty years.
The participants pointed out that there is no urgent necessary situation in order to issue decisions that have the force of law, especially in light of the current political division, as such decisions reinforce the severity of the division.
