Yoel Zussman also spelled Yoel Sussman (; 24 October 1910 – 2 March 1982) was an Israeli jurist and the fourth President of the

Supreme Court of Israel The Supreme Court of Israel (, Hebrew acronym Bagatz; ) is the Supreme court, highest court in Israel. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all other courts, and in some cases original jurisdiction. The Supreme Court consists of 15 jud ...

, from 1976 to 1980.

Biography

Sussman was born in 1910 in

Kraków , officially the Royal Capital City of Kraków, is the List of cities and towns in Poland, second-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, the city has a population of 804,237 ...

Austria-Hungary Austria-Hungary, also referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Dual Monarchy or the Habsburg Monarchy, was a multi-national constitutional monarchy in Central Europe#Before World War I, Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. A military ...

(now in

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

). He received his LLB from the

University of London The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a collegiate university, federal Public university, public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The ...

and his PhD from

Heidelberg University Heidelberg University, officially the Ruprecht Karl University of Heidelberg (; ), is a public research university in Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Founded in 1386 on instruction of Pope Urban VI, Heidelberg is Germany's oldest unive ...

. He immigrated to the British Mandate of Palestine in 1934. He was certified as a lawyer and served as Chief Prosecutor of the

Israel Defense Forces The Israel Defense Forces (IDF; , ), alternatively referred to by the Hebrew-language acronym (), is the national military of the State of Israel. It consists of three service branches: the Israeli Ground Forces, the Israeli Air Force, and ...

. In 1951 he was appointed to the Supreme Court and served as its Deputy President for several periods of time until 1953. In 1965 during the Supreme Court hearings on election appeal case ''Ya'akov Yardor vs Central Election Committee for the Sixth Knesset'', popularly known as El-Ard Petition, Sussman coined definition of Israel as a " self-defending democracy", which was adopted by the Court. Supreme Court upheld ban on El-Ard (), a radical Arab electoral list, from participation in the Sixth Knesset elections and Sussman, taking the Supreme Court of West Germany ruling as a precedent, stated that there are supraconstitutional considerations hailing from

natural law Natural law (, ) is a Philosophy, philosophical and legal theory that posits the existence of a set of inherent laws derived from nature and universal moral principles, which are discoverable through reason. In ethics, natural law theory asserts ...

, that may be superior to any legislation:

Just as an Individual is not bound to agree to being killed, neither is a state is obliged to consent to being annihilated and erased from the map... The German Constitutional Court...spoke of a "fighting democracy", which does not open its doors to acts of sabotage in the guise of legitimate parliamentary activity. For myself, as far as Israel is concerned, I am prepared to confine myself to "self-defending democracy," and tools for defending the existence of the state are at hand, even if we have not found them set forth in detail in the Elections Law

In 1976 he succeeded Shimon Agranat as President of the Supreme Court. He retired in 1980 and was succeeded by Moshe Landau. He was an author of several books on bill laws and arbitration laws. He died in 1982.

Awards and honours

* In 1975, Sussman was awarded the

Israel Prize The Israel Prize (; ''pras israél'') is an award bestowed by the State of Israel, and regarded as the state's highest cultural honor. History Prior to the Israel Prize, the most significant award in the arts was the Dizengoff Prize and in Israel ...

, in jurisprudence. * In 1984 the Institute of Advanced Judicial Studies was established in his memory.http://elyon1.court.gov.il/eng/Institute_of_Advanced_Judicial_Studies_for_2008.doc Institute of Advanced Judicial Studies

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Zussman, Yoel 1910 births 1982 deaths Alumni of the University of London Chief justices of the Supreme Court of Israel 20th-century Israeli judges Polish emigrants to Mandatory Palestine Israel Prize in law recipients Burials at Kiryat Shaul Cemetery

Biography

Awards and honours

See also

References