Democratic Values and Institutions Program

The program for Democratic Values and Institutions is designed to strengthen the state's commitment to the core democratic values enshrined in Israel's Declaration of Independence. The program works to thwart populist legislative initiatives, defend democratic institutions from attempts to undermine them, combat racism and hate speech and promote the values of freedom, equality, separation of powers and the rule of law.

Among other initiatives, the program has developed a manual for good legislation for the Knesset, launched media campaigns to block particularly harmful initiatives, and worked with elected and appointed officials across the political spectrum to explain the consequences of bad legislation and convince them to adopt more favorable alternatives.

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    Prof. Suzie Navot

    Vice President, Research

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    Suzie Navot is a full professor of constitutional and parliamentary law and, prior to her appointment, was a member of the faculty of the Striks School of Law at the College of Management Academic Studies. She earned a bachelor's degree in law from Tel Aviv University, an M.A in public policy from the Faculty of Social Sciences at Tel Aviv University and holds a doctorate in law from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

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    Adv. Anat Thon Ashkenazy

    Director, Center for Democratic Values and Institutions

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    Adv. Anat Thon-Ashkenazy is the Director of the Center for Values and Democratic Institutions at the Israel Democracy Institute.

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    Prof. Mordechai Kremnitzer

    Senior Fellow

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    Prof. Mordechai Kremnitzer is a Senior Fellow at IDI and he previously served as the Institute's Vice President of Research.

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    Prof. Yuval Shany

    Senior Fellow

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    Among other things, he has researched questions of right to equality, security detention, interrogation techniques, on-line surveillance and content moderation, military investigations, proportionality in the application of force, jurisdiction of international criminal tribunals and counterterrorism.

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    Dr. Guy Lurie

    Research Fellow

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    Dr. Guy Lurie is an attorney and holds a PhD in History from Georgetown University (2013). He a former coordinator of the Shamgar Commission for the Formulation of Rules of Ethics for Members of the Government, and served as a post-doctoral fellow on the Faculty of Law at the University of Haifa.

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    Dr. Amir Fuchs

    Senior Researcher

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    Dr. Amir Fuchs holds a doctorate from the Faculty of Law at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and is a lecturer in the Politics and Communication Department at the School of Government and Social Sciences at Hadassah Academic College.

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    Dr. Nadav Dagan

    Senior Researcher

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    Dr. Dagan Holds a PhD from Bar-Ilan University, LLM with specialism in Public Law and Human Rights Law from University College London (UCL), and LLB from the University of Haifa.

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    Dr. Moran Kandelshtein-Haina

    Researcher

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    Researcher and lecturer in the fields of public law. Dr. Kandelshtein-Haina holds a doctorate from the Faculty of Law at the Bar-Ilan University and is a lecturer in the school of Law at the Netanya Academic College. The doctoral thesis she wrote dealt with the constitutional status of the prime minister in parliamentary systems. Areas of expertise: institutional constitutional law, administrative law, the Executive.

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    Adv. Daphne Benvenisty

    Researcher

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    Daphne is a researcher at the Center for Democratic Values and Institutions. She holds an LL.B and an LL.M, both from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She has clerked at the Supreme Court in the chambers of Justice Neal Hendel.

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    Adv. Sapir Paz

    Research Assistant

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    Advocate Paz completed her L.L.B (magna cum laude) at the Hebrew University in 2020. She completed her legal internship in the State Attorney's office at the High Court of Justice Department and was licensed as a lawyer in Israel in 2021.
    In 2022, she worked as a law clerk to Judge Eyal Avrahami, the President of the Regional Labor Court in Jerusalem, and later as law clerk to Judge Varda Virt-Livne, the President of the National Labor Court of Israel.
    Sapir is also a Masters student in the Critical Cultural Studies program at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

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    Adv. Nisreen Abo Asalh

    Research Assistant

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    Adv. Abo Asalh completed her Bachelor of Law studies at the University of Haifa in 2020, specialized in the consulting and legislation department (constitutional law) and qualified in 2021 as an attorney. Prior to joining the IDI, Adv. Abo Asalh worked for about two years at the firm of Firon & Co. in the planning and construction department. Today, concurrently with her work at the IDI, Abo Asalh works as an attorney at the office of Yosef Yeshurun & Co.

    In the past, Adv. Abo Asalh established a number of social projects.

    Nisreen Abo Asalh is a master's student in public law at the Tel Aviv - Northwestern program.