1. See Maoz, Asher, “Historical Adjudication: Courts of Law, Commissions of Inquiry, and ‘Historical Truth,’” Law and History Review 18 (2000): 576–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2. Ibid., 563, n. 11.

3. Ibid., 575.

4. It should be emphasized that, under Israeli law, the Attorney General enjoys full independence in deciding to pursue criminal charges and is not subordinate to the government or any of its members; see Report of the Agranat Committee [On the Powers of the Attorney General] (Jerusalem: Ministry of Justice, 1963).

5. For that reason it was suggested that Begin's government restricted the commission's terms of reference in the Arlosoroff case; see Maoz, “Historical Adjudication,” 576, n. 54.

6. Abraham's assertion that the Bechor Commission “cleared the Revisionists of any culpability” is not supported by its conclusions. It was unable to establish “who were the murderers” and “whether it was a political murder.” Yet one of its three members regarded this possibility “a theoretical speculation,” while another saw it as “not reasonable.” Only one viewed it as “a possibility” among “other assumptions.”

7. Some cases that are submitted to commissions of inquiry deal with episodes that provide convenient soil for far-reaching conspiracy theories. The assassination of leaders like President Kennedy and Prime Minister Rabin fall into this category. Many regarded the findings in both these cases to the effect that the murders were carried out by lone assassins as too simplistic. Although the report of the Shamgar Commission (Va'a'dat ha'hakira le'inyan retzah rosh ha'memshala mar Yitzhak Rabin zal: Din ve'heshbon [The Commission of Inquiry in the Matter of the Assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin: Report] (Jerusalem: 1996) was more broadly accepted than the Warren Report, several people, including members of the Rabin family, have demanded the appointment of a new commission to investigate fresh information regarding the murder.

8. See Lahav, Pnina, Judgment in Jerusalem: Chief Justice Simon Agranat and the Zionist Century (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), 229–33Google Scholar; Ze'ev, Moshe Ben, “‘Ha'dereg ha'medini'mul va'a”dot hakira—Ha'imut, ha'metah, ha'pehadim [“The Political Level” vis-à-vis Comissions of Inquiry—The Confrontation, the Tensions, the Fears],” in Sefer Yitzhak Kahan—Le'zichro shel Yitzhak Kahan nessi beit ha'mishpat ha'elyon [The Yitzhak Kahan Book—In Memory of Yitzhak Kahan, President of the Supreme Court], ed. Elon, Menahem et al. (Tel-Aviv: Papyrus, 1989) 234, 239.Google Scholar

9. Nedava, Joseph, “Almoni bemoked shel se'ara historit [Anonymous in the Focus of a Historical Storm],” Ha'ne'esham hasheni: Ma'avako shel Zvi Rosenblatt legiluy ha'emet [The Second Accused: Zvi Rosenblatt's Struggle for the Truth], ed. Nedava, Joseph (Tel-Aviv: Machon Jabotinsky, 1986), 28–29.Google Scholar

10. See Schechtman, Joseph B., Fighter and Prophet: The Vladimir Jabotinsky Story: The Last Years (New York: Thomas Yoseloff, 1961), 186–87.Google Scholar

11. A Hebrew translation by Yevin, Yehoshua, “Mitoch krirut ve'eytanut,” was published in Be'ikvoth ne'e'lamim: Le'parashat Arlosoroff [In the Hidden Foothsteps: The Arlosoroff Case], ed. Bechar, Arye (Tel-Aviv: Lipsha Zjamson, 1989), 9.Google Scholar

12. According to the Revisionists, he agreed to help but reneged after pressured by Yarblum, a leftist from the Paris Jewish Agency. Yet Jabotinsky got the support of Schloss-berg, Grusenberg's aid, in defending the blood libel victim Blonds in Vilna in 1902. See Ben-Yeruham, H. (Merhavia, H.), Ha'a'lila ha'gedola, Lifney retzah Arlosoroffu'leaharav [The Great Libel: The Arlosoroff Case] (Tel-Aviv: Machon Jabotinsky, 1982), 62–63.Google Scholar

13. Both comparisons were adopted in the Revisionist ideology. Thus, Ahimeir, who appeared in Stavsky's trial as witness, refused to sit “on the chair on which Vera Cheberiak, the greatest liar in our generation sat”; Zvi Rozenblatt, “Ba'yeshiva'u'bimhitzato (Im Petirato shel Abba Ahimeir) [In Jail and in His Company (With the Death of Abba Ahimeir)],” in Ha'ne'e'sham ha'sheni, ed. Nedava, 70, 72. Ahimeir was referring to the fact that Arlosoroff's wife, who had given evidence the day before, had sat on that chair, yet he used the name of the key witness for the prosecution in Beilis's trial. Possibly, there was a certain innuendo in this comparison, as Cheberiak herself was a major suspect in the murder investigation; see Cotic, Meir, U'mishpat Beilis: Alilot dam ba'me'a ha'esrim [The Beilis Trial: Blood Libel in the Twentieth Century] (Tel-Aviv: Milo, 1978), 38–41.Google Scholar Nedava referred to the writer Ben-Zion Katz, who published the famous essay in defense of the persons accused of Arlosoroff's murder, though he did not belong to the Revisionist circles, as “the Jewish Emile Zola” Nedava, “Almoni be'moked shel se'ara historit,” 29.

14. See Yitzhak Shamir, “Hedey ha'yamim ha'shehorim ve'ha'adumim [Echoes of the Black and Red Days],” in Ha'ne'esham ha'sheni, ed. Nedava, 84. This accusation was repeated recently by the leader of the Likud party, Ariel Sharon, who added that had this happened, it would have changed Jewish history entirely.

15. The Commission of Inquiry into the Events at the Refugee Camps in Beirut, 1983: Final Report.

16. Pages 139–49 of the original Hebrew version.

17. “The Verdict is Guilty: An Israeli commission apportions the blame for the Beirut massacre,” Time, 21 February 1983, 29; the relevant paragraph is cited in Sharon v. Time, Inc., 575 F. Supp. (S.D.N.Y. 1983) 1162, 1164–65.

18. Ibid., at 1169.

19. Ibid., at 1170. Hope has even been expressed that the commission may be remembered as “laying the ground for a novel concept in international law” Ben Ze'ev, “‘Ha'dereg ha'medini,’” 237.

20. See Sharon v. Time, Inc., 599 F. Supp. (S.D.N.Y. 1984) 538, 567.

21. Sharon issued concurrent proceedings against the publisher of the European edition of Time in an Israeli court (C/A [Tel-Aviv] 460/83, Sharon v. Time-Life International B.V., not published). On this occasion he was more successful. The court rejected Time's defense of the truth of the publication and that it was not libelous, based on the New York Court verdict. This practically concluded the case, as under Israeli law no proof of malice is required in libel suits submitted by public figures. Following the court's decision the parties reached a compromise regarding the amount of damages to be paid by Time.

22. Sonder, Moshe, “Shalom la'sandak, sliha mi'sar ha'hutz [Bye to the Godfather, Apology to the Minister of Foreign Affairs],” Ma'a'riv, Sofshavua [Weekend], 23 October 1998, 12.Google Scholar

23. See p. 4179 of the court's records.

24. A further libel suit ended less favorably for Sharon. The daily Ha'aretz published an article making an accusation that Begin knew that Sharon deceived him concerning the Lebanon war. The correspondent referred to Sharon being blamed for obtaining the Begin government's approval for the invasion of Lebanon through false pretenses, as if he was planning a limited military operation. The court found that the correspondent expressed a bona fide opinion of Sharon's behavior in an official position. Moreover, the correspondent succeeded in establishing the truth of the article. Of interest is Judge Moshe Talgam's opening statement: “This judgement does not purport to establish historical facts. The ability of a court to establish true facts, with reasonable certainty, is limited. This is so as the court has no access to facts save those presented by the parties. The court is prevented from carrying out further inquiries and clarifications, and the limitations imposed by the rules of evidence do not assist in revealing the truth. One who expects the court to expose historical truth is wrong. The court is particularly restricted in establishing historical truths in the circumstances of this case because of the privilege imposed on information sources that made them unavailable to the defendants and the court. It is feasible that upon the revealing of these sources, the established historical facts might change. The facts are established in court merely to determine between the litigating parties;” C/A (Tel-Aviv) 818/93, Sharon v. Benziman, not published. An appeal against the judgment is pending: C. App. 323/98, Sharon v. Benziman.

25. Shlomo Levin, “Kavim lidemuto shel Yitzhak Kanan [Portrait of Yitzhak Kanan],” in Sefer Yitzhak Kahan, ed. Elon et al., 13.

26. Recently, a remnant of the Kastner case came before the Supreme Court of Israel. In his docudrama Mishpat Kastner [The Kastner Trial] (Tel-Aviv: Or ve'tzel, 1994), Motti Lerner made Kastner throw at Hanah Senesh's mother that her daughter broke down during the course of being interrogated and handed over her two comrades to the Hungarian police. There was no factual basis for this accusation. Moreover, Kastner never raised this allegation in court. Giora Senesh, Hannah's brother, petitioned the Supreme Court sitting as the High Court of Justice to order the Israeli Broadcast Authority to remove this scene from the play that it intended to screen on Israel's state television (H.C. 6124, 6143/94, Senesh v. The Israel Broadcast Authority, forthcoming). For the parachutists episode, see Maoz, “Historical Adjudication,” 590, n. 93. The Court rejected the petition. President Barak, writing for the majority, stated: “The controversial paragraph does not reflect historical truth. It has no historical foundation whatsoever. It is not true.” Nevertheless, stated Barak, “a democratic society which loves freedom does not make its protection of expression and art contingent on them reflecting the truth…. A democratic society does not protect a legend by harming freedom of expression and art. The legend must stem from the free exchange of opinions and views. It must not be a result of governmental restrictions on freedom of expression and art. Hannah Senesh's legend will exist and flourish thanks to the freedom of the truth, not following the silencing of the untruth.” Barak quoted another president of the Supreme Court, Justice Moshe Landau, who stated: “The distortion of historical facts does not justify the disqualification, because its creators could argue that there is no single historical truth; rather each historian has his own truth. And, anyway, since when does untruth disqualify a movie or a play from being screened or performed in a state which guarantees freedom of expression to the citizen” H.C. 807/78, Ein Gal v. The Board for Supervision of Films and Plays, 33 (1) P.D. 274, 277. (Censorship on films exists in Israel under the Cinematograph Films Ordinance, 1927; R. H. Drayton, The Laws of Palestine [London: Waterlow and Sons, 1934], vol. 1, ch. 16, p. 135. See, generally, More, Daniel, “Film and Theatre Censorship in Israel,” Israel Yearbook on Human Rights 9 [1979]: 225.)Google Scholar