Hey everyone, welcome back to My Weird Prompts. I am Corn, and I am sitting here in our living room in Jerusalem on this chilly twenty-second of January, twenty twenty-six. I am joined by my brother, the man who probably knows more about niche legal history than is strictly healthy for a donkey.
Herman Poppleberry, at your service. And hey, I resemble that remark! But in all seriousness, today's prompt is a real treat because it hits close to home. Our housemate Daniel sent us a voice note earlier. He was reflecting on his own background in law back in Ireland and comparing it to the system we live in here in Israel.
Yeah, Daniel's got that legal mind, always thinking about the frameworks. He was asking about the actual ingredients that make up the corpus of law in Israel right now, in early twenty twenty-six. It is a fascinating question because, for most people, the law is just this monolithic thing. But in Israel, it is more like a geological excavation. You have these layers of history sitting on top of each other.
That is exactly the right way to think about it, Corn. It is a legal lasagna, but some of the layers are hundreds of years old and were cooked in entirely different kitchens. Daniel specifically wanted to know if the Ottoman and British traces are just residual at this point, or if they have been totally displaced by modern Israeli statutes and case law.
It is a great starting point. Because if you look at the map of Israeli law, you see these names like the Majjala or the Mandate Ordinances. To a casual observer, that sounds like ancient history. But when you are trying to figure out who owns a piece of land or how a contract is interpreted, those ghosts of the past can suddenly become very loud.
They really can. And I think to answer Daniel’s question, we have to look at the big picture first. Israel is one of the few democracies in the world without a single, formal, written constitution. Instead, we have what we call the Basic Laws. We discussed the shift toward more structured digital governance back in episode two hundred and sixty-two, but the foundational legal architecture is still this evolving, uncodified thing.
Right, and that lack of a formal constitution is really the engine that drives a lot of the complexity. Since there is no single supreme document that outlines everything, the system has had to pull from whatever was available at the time. When the state was founded in nineteen forty-eight, they couldn't just delete all the laws and start from scratch. That would have been chaos.
Exactly. It is called the Law and Administration Ordinance of nineteen forty-eight. It was basically a copy-paste command. It said that the law that existed in the land on May fourteenth, nineteen forty-eight, would remain in force as long as it did not contradict the new state's establishment. So, overnight, Israel inherited a massive trunk full of British and Ottoman rules.
So, let’s talk about that Ottoman layer first. The Majjala. It sounds so exotic, but it was essentially the civil code of the Ottoman Empire, based on Islamic law but codified in the nineteenth century. Herman, is that still a thing? Does a judge in twenty twenty-six ever actually open the Majjala?
The short answer is: almost never, because the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, spent decades systematically replacing it. The Majjala was officially repealed in its entirety in nineteen eighty-four with the Foundations of Law Act. But here is the nuance Daniel is looking for. While the Majjala itself is gone, the Ottoman Land Code of eighteen fifty-eight is still the bedrock of the Land Registry.
Like the land categories, right? I remember reading that some land in Israel is still classified using Ottoman terms like Miri or Mulk.
You nailed it. Miri land is the big one. Under the Ottoman code, Miri was land that belonged to the Sultan, but individuals had the right to use it. Even today, that influence means most land in Israel is owned by the state and leased out. And get this: the old Ottoman rule of use it or lose it still echoes. If you leave certain types of Miri land uncultivated for three years, it can theoretically revert to the state. So the Majjala is dead as a statute, but its ghost still manages the dirt under our feet.
That is fascinating. It is like the plumbing of an old house. You might put in new faucets, but the pipes behind the wall are still the ones laid down a century ago. But what about the British? That seems much more recent and influential on how the courts actually function.
Oh, the British influence is massive. It is the dominant flavor of the lasagna after the modern Israeli layer. The British Mandate lasted from nineteen twenty-two to nineteen forty-eight, and they brought the Common Law system with them. That means they brought the idea of judicial precedent—that the decisions of higher courts are binding on lower courts.
And that is a huge departure from the Civil Law systems you see in places like France or Germany, where everything is supposed to be in a code.
Huge. And even though Israel has passed its own laws for almost eighty years now, the methodology is very British. Many of the core ingredients in criminal law and torts started out as British Mandate Ordinances. If you look at the Civil Wrongs Ordinance or the Interpretation Ordinance, they are still the primary basis for how we handle negligence or how we even read other laws. They have been amended a million times, but the skeleton is British.
So, would you say the British traces are residual, or are they integrated?
I would say they are integrated to the point of being foundational. However, the displacing Daniel asked about is definitely happening. Over the last forty years, the Knesset has been on a mission to Israelize the law. But even when you replace a law, the judicial memory remains. And there is another ingredient we can't ignore: the role of religious law.
Right, the dual system. Daniel mentioned the Sharia courts and the Beth Din, the Jewish rabbinical courts. How does a religious court fit into a modern, high-tech state in twenty twenty-six?
It is a remnant of the Millet system from the Ottoman era, which the British kept and the Israelis maintained. Basically, matters of personal status—mostly marriage and divorce—are under the jurisdiction of religious courts. If you are Jewish, your marriage is handled by the Rabbinical courts. If you are Muslim, it is the Sharia courts.
It is a strange tension, isn't it? On one hand, you have the Supreme Court in Jerusalem, which is incredibly modern. And on the other hand, you have these religious courts applying laws that are, in some cases, thousands of years old.
It is the ultimate My Weird Prompts topic. And the friction between those two systems is where a lot of Israel's constitutional drama happens. Because there is no written constitution, the Supreme Court has often had to step in and define the boundaries.
That leads us to the modern layer. The one Daniel is probably encountering most as a resident. How much of the daily law in twenty twenty-six is just pure Israeli legislation?
A huge amount, and it is growing fast. If you are talking about high-tech law or data privacy, that is all modern Israeli statute. In fact, we just had a massive update. On August fourteenth, twenty twenty-five, Amendment thirteen to the Protection of Privacy Law took effect. It is basically Israel's version of the European G-D-P-R. It introduced the category of highly sensitive information, which covers things like biometric and genetic data, and it gave the Privacy Protection Authority huge powers to issue fines in the millions of shekels.
So we are moving away from those British skeletons in the digital world?
Definitely. We are also seeing a policy-led approach to A-I. While there isn't a single horizontal A-I statute yet, the government has been using a Responsible Innovation policy since twenty twenty-three, and the Privacy Protection Authority just issued new guidelines in May of twenty twenty-five on how A-I systems have to handle personal data. We are not looking at the British Mandate to decide who is liable if an A-I-driven delivery drone bumps into a balcony in Tel Aviv.
I would hope not. I don't think the British had much to say about drones in nineteen forty-five. But Herman, we have to talk about the elephant in the room—the Constitutional Revolution and the recent judicial battles. Where does that stand in twenty twenty-six?
That is the spiciest layer of the lasagna. Back in nineteen ninety-two, the Knesset passed Basic Laws on Human Dignity and Liberty. Chief Justice Aharon Barak used those to establish judicial review. But the real turning point for our current era was January first, twenty twenty-four. That was when the Supreme Court struck down the Reasonableness Standard law. It was the first time in history the court struck down an amendment to a Basic Law. It basically said the court has the final word on the core democratic identity of the state.
And that tension is still live, right? I saw news this morning about the governing coalition advancing new bills to subordinate ministerial legal advisors.
Exactly. It is a constant tug-of-war. As of this week in January twenty twenty-six, the government is pushing to politicize the appointment of the Civil Service Commissioner. And we have a big deadline coming up: if the twenty twenty-six budget isn't passed by March thirty-first, the government dissolves automatically. So the legal corpus isn't just a set of rules; it is a live battlefield for the future of the social contract.
So, if we were to give Daniel a percentage breakdown of the ingredients in the Israeli legal corpus in twenty twenty-six, what would it look like?
I’d say sixty percent is modern Israeli statute law—especially with these new privacy and tech overhauls. Twenty percent is Israeli case law and the Supreme Court’s interpretations. Ten percent is the integrated British layer—those Mandate Ordinances that still provide the skeleton for torts and criminal law. Five percent is the Religious Courts. And the final five percent? Those are the legal ghosts. The Ottoman land classifications and the obscure procedural rules that only come out during expensive court battles.
That five percent of ghosts sounds small, but I bet that is where the most expensive legal battles happen.
Always. The more obscure the rule, the more hours a lawyer can bill to find it! But honestly, Corn, what I find most interesting is how this reflects the identity of the country. It is a state trying to be a Jewish state, a democratic state, and a globalized tech hub all at once.
It’s a great point. And it connects back to what Daniel was saying about the digital government. Israel has been very aggressive about moving its services online. You can check the land registry or file court documents through a single digital portal. But the law behind that digital interface is still this complex, multi-layered thing. The Privacy Protection Authority even issued new guidelines last year specifically about how national I-D cards can be used in digital health data.
It’s like a sleek smartphone running on a patchwork of code written over fifty years. It works, but if you dig deep enough, you find some very strange comments in the source code.
Let’s wrap this up with a takeaway for Daniel. If he's living here in twenty twenty-six, what is the one weird legal thing he should actually be aware of?
I’d say it is the Good Faith principle. It is everywhere. Sections twelve and thirty-nine of the Contracts Law say you must act in a customary manner and in good faith. In many systems, if the contract says you can do something, you can do it. But in Israel, a judge can look at you and say, yeah, that was legal, but you were being a jerk, so I am ruling against you.
That feels very Middle Eastern in a way. It’s less about the rigid, cold letter of the law and more about the relationship and the context.
It really is. It’s a bridge between the formal British style and the more communal traditions of the region.
Well, I feel like I've just finished a very intense semester of law school, but with much better snacks. Daniel, thanks for sending that in. It really forced us to look at the ground we are standing on. It’s easy to forget that the laws we live under are a living history.
It really is. And for those of you listening who are legal nerds, I highly recommend looking into the Foundations of Law Act. It tells you everything you need to know about how Israel tries to balance its past and its future.
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Thanks again to our housemate Daniel for the prompt. We’ll try not to leave any more empty pizza boxes on the couch, Daniel. We don't want to test that negligence theory of yours.
Speak for yourself, Corn. I think my pizza crust defense is legally sound.
We’ll see you in court, Herman. Until next time, everyone.
This has been My Weird Prompts. Keep asking the weird questions.
Peace.
Bye!
So, Herman, seriously, what is the pizza crust defense?
It’s based on the principle of Assumption of Risk. If you live with a donkey, you have to assume there will be some agricultural byproduct in the living room.
I’m pretty sure no judge in Jerusalem is going to buy that.
You’d be surprised. There’s an Ottoman precedent for everything.
(Laughs) Alright, we’re out.
(Fading out) No, really! There’s this nineteenth-century ruling about livestock in shared dwellings...
Stop. Just stop.
I'm just saying!
(Silence)
(Whispering) It’s in the Majjala.
(Off-mic) It’s not in the Majjala!
(Off-mic) Section eight hundred and twelve! Look it up!
(Off-mic) We are done!
(Off-mic) Good faith, Corn! Act in good faith!
(Laughter)
