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The Objective: Broadcast Media Authority With Links to the Political Echelon

>> Read the full Position Paper in PDF

Chapter B of the Bill for Broadcast Media Law-2025 deals with the creation of the Broadcast Media Authority (BMA) and attendant Audiovisual Content Regulation Council (ACRC). Zulat’s position is that the arrangements set out in the bill will bestow influence on actors associated with the governing echelon in a way that will harm the independence of these two new bodies.

According to the explanatory notes attached to the bill, the new body is intended to be “independent” and possess “professional capabilities.” However, not only does it fail to sever actors with ties to the governing echelon from the BMA, but it accords them substantial influence over the selection of the ACRC’s members and over its activities, and vests them with extensive and substantive powers in the regulation of broadcast media in Israel – first and foremost, far-reaching powers to revoke the registration of content providers and to impose significant monetary sanctions.

Among other things, the search committee that will select the ACRC’s members will be primarily consist of government officials. Moreover, the director general of the Communications Ministry (who, as is well known, is Minister Shlomo Karhi’s appointee in a position of trust) will serve as its chair and will be in control of the candidates presented for selection as ACRC members. Ultimately, at least five of the ACRC’s seven members – the four public representatives chosen by the search committee, and the three employees on behalf of the Communications Ministry, the Regulatory Authority, and the Competition Authority – will be selected or appointed with the substantial involvement of the governing echelon.

By way of comparison, under the model established in the Public Broadcasting Law, all members of the Israel Public Broadcasting Corporation Council are selected by an independent and autonomous search committee. The Communications Minister appoints a retired judge as its chair, and that is the extent of the minister’s role. The chairman appoints two additional members, and once they are appointed, the search committee is free to select all the other members.

The inevitable conclusion is that the bill does not seek to establish an independent authority, but rather one facilitating political influence. In Zulat’s view, the format proposed in the bill should not be implemented and should be replaced with a model that ensures its independence and autonomy, similar to the one set in the Public Broadcasting Law.

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Dr. Maha Sabbah Karkabi

 

Senior Lecturer in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. She holds a Ph.D. in Sociology from Tel Aviv University (2015), a postdoctoral fellowship at the Center for Gender Studies, SOAS, University of London (2015-2016), a postdoctoral fellowship in the Department of Sociology at Tel Aviv University (2016-2017), and a postdoctoral fellowship Ph.D. at the Humphrey Institute for Social Research, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (2018-2020).
Dr. Maha Karbahi’s areas of interest focus on the connection between social change, family behavior, and gender inequality in societies in the process of change and specifically in Palestinian Arab society in Israel. Her research draws attention to the study of family life and employment, using a combined “ethnic lens” and “gender lens” and paying attention to the perspective of Palestinian Arab women, a group characterized by intersections between multiple marginal locations, which over the years has remained hidden from the research eye. Dr. Karkabi-Sabah’s research is published in professional journals and chapters in scientific books that are considered pioneers in family research, work, and gender equality.

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Prof. Frances Raday

Professor Emeritus in the Lieberman Chair in Labor Law, in the Faculty of Law at the Hebrew University and serves as a full professor in the College of Management’s academic track, where she also serves as chair of the graduate program and as honorary president of the Concord Center for International Law Absorption. Radai was a member of a working group of the UN Human Rights Council on discrimination against women. In addition, she is a prominent and feminist human rights activist.

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Dr. Rawia Aburabia 

Faculty member of Sapir Academic College’s School of Law, received her PhD from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Her research deals with the interface between law, gender, minorities, and human rights. Has published in leading journals on the subject of the matrimonial laws pertaining to Muslim women in Israel. Her book Under the Law, Outside Justice: Polygamy, Gendered Citizenship, and Colonialism in Israeli Law is expected to be published as part of the Gender Series of Kibbutz Meuhad Publishing House.

Dr. Aburabia has extensive experience in international human rights and public law. She has worked as a jurist for the Association for Civil Right and has been invited as a specialist to address such international forums as the United Nations and the European Parliament on the subject of indigenous communities and minority rights. She has interned with Human Rights Watch in Washington DC, and has been a member of the executive board of Amnesty International. In 2018, she was selected by the magazine Globes as one of the 40 most promising young persons in Israel under the age of 40.

 

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Ron Kessler

With over two decades of experience in the field of digital content, Ron has participated in numerous political and social campaigns. He helped run the digital activity of senior public officials, and worked in various NGOs. Ron is a fundamentally optimistic man, who believes that Israel can be changed and so can people. Lives in Tel Aviv.