Israel Constitutional amendment Enacted 2022-12-22

"Deri Law" — Amendment to Basic Law: The Government (minister with a suspended sentence)

تعديل قانون أساس: الحكومة ("قانون درعي")

Summary

Amendment to Basic Law: The Government rushed through the Knesset in December 2022 by the incoming Netanyahu coalition so that Shas leader Aryeh Deri could be appointed minister despite a January 2022 suspended sentence for tax offences. The amendment narrowed the grounds on which a person with a suspended (non-custodial) sentence is barred from serving as a minister; Deri was sworn in as interior and health minister on 29 December 2022.

Impact

A constitutional change enacted to benefit a single coalition leader — a focal case for the democracy / rule-of-law axis. The High Court of Justice on 18 January 2023 ruled 10–1 that Deri's appointment was "unreasonable in the extreme" and ordered his dismissal, while declining to strike the Basic Law amendment itself.

Parties involved

Shas

Sources

Permalink https://tarekgara.com/tayyar/bills/06c4c815-47e7-40c6-a650-ebbf1ddccf8e

How to cite

This is a citation for the legislation itself — credited to Knesset and dated to its 2022 introduction. Tayyar is the retrieval surface, not the author. A separate "Retrieved via" line records that you accessed it through this dataset.

In-text: (Knesset, 2022)

APA 7Institutional author

Knesset. (2022). "Deri Law" — Amendment to Basic Law: The Government (minister with a suspended sentence) [Legislation]. https://www.loc.gov/item/global-legal-monitor/2023-01-30/israel-high-court-orders-prime-minister-netanyahu-to-dismiss-minister-with-multiple-criminal-convictions/. Retrieved via Tayyar (https://tarekgara.com/tayyar/bills/06c4c815-47e7-40c6-a650-ebbf1ddccf8e) on July 27, 2026.

Chicago author-dateCommon in political-science journals

Knesset. 2022. “"Deri Law" — Amendment to Basic Law: The Government (minister with a suspended sentence).” Legislation. https://www.loc.gov/item/global-legal-monitor/2023-01-30/israel-high-court-orders-prime-minister-netanyahu-to-dismiss-minister-with-multiple-criminal-convictions/. Retrieved via Tayyar, July 27, 2026.

BibTeXLaTeX / Zotero / reference managers

@misc{tayyar-bill-06c4c815-47e7-40c6-a650-ebbf1ddccf8e,
  title     = {{"Deri Law" — Amendment to Basic Law: The Government (minister with a suspended sentence)}},
  author    = {{Knesset}},
  year      = {2022},
  date      = {2022-12-22},
  type      = {Legislation},
  url       = {https://www.loc.gov/item/global-legal-monitor/2023-01-30/israel-high-court-orders-prime-minister-netanyahu-to-dismiss-minister-with-multiple-criminal-convictions/},
  urldate   = {2026-07-27},
  note      = {Retrieved via Tayyar (https://tarekgara.com/tayyar/bills/06c4c815-47e7-40c6-a650-ebbf1ddccf8e) on July 27, 2026}
}