Israel · Overview
The legal system of Israel
A mixed system with an unusual constitutional structure. The common-law inheritance came through the British Mandate — binding precedent, adversarial procedure, judicial development of doctrine — but since 1980 the Foundations of Law Act has directed courts to fill gaps from Israel's own heritage of freedom, justice, equity and peace rather than from English law. Private law has been progressively codified in civil-law style through separate statutes on contract, sale, agency and unjust enrichment. Personal status is governed by religious law and administered by the recognised communities' own courts: rabbinical courts for Jews, sharia courts for Muslims, and druze and Christian ecclesiastical courts.
Legal tradition
Israel belongs to the mixed common law and civil law tradition. A mixed system with an unusual constitutional structure. The common-law inheritance came through the British Mandate — binding precedent, adversarial procedure, judicial development of doctrine — but since 1980 the Foundations of Law Act has directed courts to fill gaps from Israel's own heritage of freedom, justice, equity and peace rather than from English law. Private law has been progressively codified in civil-law style through separate statutes on contract, sale, agency and unjust enrichment. Personal status is governed by religious law and administered by the recognised communities' own courts: rabbinical courts for Jews, sharia courts for Muslims, and druze and Christian ecclesiastical courts.
How power is divided
Unitary, with municipalities and regional councils exercising delegated powers. Different legal regimes apply in the West Bank, where military orders and Jordanian-derived law operate alongside Israeli law applied personally to settlers, and the atlas records that separately under Palestine rather than folding it into this entry.
Where law comes from
- Basic Laws
- Function as the constitution; two contain limitation clauses with supra-legislative effect.
- Knesset statutes
- Ordinary primary legislation, published in Reshumot.
- Judicial precedent
- Supreme Court decisions bind lower courts; the Court is not bound by its own.
- Codified private-law statutes
- Contracts, Sale, Agency, Unjust Enrichment and related Acts.
- Religious personal law
- Applied by rabbinical, sharia, druze and Christian courts by community.
The legal profession
A single fused profession of advocates admitted by the Israel Bar Association, which is a statutory body: membership is compulsory and it controls the bar examinations and the mandatory articles year. Israel has one of the highest ratios of lawyers to population in the world. Notarial functions are performed by senior advocates licensed as notaries rather than by a separate notariat, which distinguishes the system from its civil-law neighbours.
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