Following pressure from the state’s side, the judge presiding over our appeal for migrant workers’ freedom of relationship – was forced to recuse himself. In our opinion, there is no legal obligation for the recusal, and thus it harms the effort for a just trial.
When we informed the worker whose name we appealed in, he asked:
“Is the judge married to a caregiving worker?” to which the answer is negative.
He pressed on “Is the judge married to an Indian woman?” and we had to answer “no” again.
“So where exactly is the conflict of interest?”
We must agree.
In the opening of our objection to Judge Dorfman’s disqualification, we wrote: “Let it be said: the appealers object to the qualification of the Judge, and believe the request made by the Ministry of Interior is flawed by heavy laches, lack of good faith and foreign consideration. It is naught but a faulty, unprecedented attempt to intimidate the court and dissuade it from deciding on an appeal that concerns a faulty, dangerous policy. It is amazing to observe, on an appeal that regards, among others, dangerous invasion to migrant workers’ privacy and intimate relationships, how the Ministry of Interior uses similar methods of invasion to the private life and relationships of the Judge himself. It is as if everyone who steps into the Ministry’s halls give in his or her private relationships for the Ministry’s use, as a tool of intimidation.”
To Lee Yaron’s Haaretz Article
