After more than six months without a permanent director, Yahuda Eliyahu was chosen to head the Israel Land Authority, having previously served as head of the Settlement Administration in the Defense Ministry. Since taking office, officials at the authority say he has helped stabilize the organization and push order on core issues, including housing prices, preventing land grabs in open areas in the Negev, and granting land benefits to reservists.
Eliyahu was selected by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and Housing Minister, after ranking first in the appointment committee with 93 points. Because of his political ties to the finance minister, the committee’s legal adviser, Efrat Prakchia, required a review of whether he had “special and surplus qualifications.”
The committee, made up of senior public-sector figures including Budget Department chief Mahran Prozfner, the head of the Defense Ministry’s security division Gil Reich, Prof. Idit Solberg, Tourism Ministry Director General Michael Yitzhaku and Israel Employment Service Director General Inbal Meshash, discussed the matter in two meetings. In a four-page reasoned letter, they unanimously concluded that Eliyahu had special and surplus qualifications over the other candidates, and the Housing Ministry’s legal adviser later said there was no legal obstacle to the appointment.
Despite that process and the state’s defense of the nomination in petitions filed against it, the Supreme Court issued an order nisi. At the first hearing, the justices said they were leaning toward cancelling the appointment, saying it was “hard to explain the committee’s position” on his special qualifications. The court is effectively challenging the professional bodies that selected him, while supporters, including dozens of local council heads from across the political spectrum, say his experience in public and municipal work makes him well suited to the job.
