The High Court of Justice opened Tuesday’s hearing on petitions against the government’s decision to close Army Radio by pressing the state over public statements made by members of the advisory committee Defense Minister Israel Katz appointed to examine the station’s future.
The hearing, held before Justices Dafna Barak-Erez, Alex Stein, and Yechiel Kasher, centered from its opening moments on whether some members of Katz’s committee had expressed firm views against Galatz before beginning their work, and whether those statements tainted the process that led to the closure recommendation.
The committee was appointed by Katz in 2025 to review the future of Army Radio, a military-run station that also operates as a national news and current-affairs broadcaster. It ultimately recommended either closing Galatz’s news and current-affairs division or shutting the station entirely. Katz adopted the more sweeping option.
The government approved the closure on December 22, ordering the 75-year-old station to end its broadcasts within roughly two months. The move was originally set to take effect on March 1, but was frozen under an interim court order while the petitions are heard.
At the heart of Tuesday’s hearing was not only the broader question of whether a military station should operate as a national broadcaster, but whether the government did the required administrative work before deciding to shut it down.
The justices’ questions went directly to one of the petitioners’ central claims: that the committee’s conclusions were shaped by predetermined views rather than an open professional examination. The Army Radio workers’ committee and the Histadrut labor federation have argued that some committee members made or shared public statements portraying Galatz as hostile to the state before they were appointed to review it.
The state has argued that Army Radio is an anomaly - a military unit, funded by the state, that also broadcasts news, interviews, and political current affairs to the broader Israeli public. Katz has said there is no justification for a military station to engage in political and public-affairs broadcasting.
Attorney-General warns Army Radio no longer internal military issue
Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara has taken the opposite legal position, warning that Galatz can no longer be treated as a narrow internal military issue. In her January filing, which she asked the court to treat as her main position for Tuesday’s hearing, she argued that after more than 75 years on air, Army Radio has become part of Israel’s public broadcasting landscape.
According to estimates cited in that filing, Galatz reaches close to one million listeners a day and is one of only two nationwide Hebrew public radio stations with a full news desk and current-affairs programming.
Baharav-Miara argued that closing such a station by government decision, rather than through primary legislation in the Knesset, raises serious legal difficulties, particularly when the decision affects Israel’s media landscape and freedom of the press.
Petitioners point to previous recommendations
The petitioners also point to the sequence that preceded Katz’s decision. A previous committee, appointed in 2023 by then-defense minister Yoav Gallant and headed by then-Defense Ministry director-general Eyal Zamir, recommended keeping Galatz inside the IDF while introducing reforms. Katz later appointed a new committee, which reached the opposite conclusion within a short time.
The workers’ petition adds a labor dimension to the case, arguing that the decision would effectively dismiss dozens of civilian IDF employees without meaningful consultation, a real closure plan, or substantive negotiations.
