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  • Human Rights Alert NGO
    • Jun 21, 2019
    • 1 min read

2015-06-28 When it comes to the First Amendment - Israel scores an "F"

The Tel-Aviv Magistrate Court issued last week an unprecedented "Restraining Order", which prohibits activist Barak Cohen from any speech, related to Bank HaPoalim CEO Zion Keinan. The order amounts to Prior Restraint of Free Speech... It comes in the footsteps of a series of gag orders, trying to prevent the publication of news regarding government corruption in general, and judicial corruption in particular...

Attorney Barak Cohen has become a trailblazing social protest activist, being able to rub the justice system the wrong way through artful provocations. In the latest round, he managed to provoke the Tel-Aviv court into issuing on him a Prior Restraint order, prohibiting him of making any public speech related to Zion Keinan, Bank HaPoalim top executive, key figure in fraud by the banks in collusion with the courts.

https://www.opednews.com/articles/When-it-comes-to-the-First-by-Joseph-Zernik-Banking-Fraud_Freedom-Of-The-Press_Israel_Judicial-Corruption-150628-481.html

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Joseph Zernik, PhD  Research Director

Dr Zernik’s core research pertains to e-government, government cyber operations, and their implications relative to human rights, civil society, and democratic institutions.

His work won appreciation in Israel and abroad:

  • Prof Uzzi Ornan - “All power to you! I hope that you see your tremendous efforts reach fruition!”

  • Attorney Avigdor Feldman - “In my opinion you are doing very important work… thank you for your thorough and persistent work”.

  • Prof Amnon Shashua, Mobileye Co-founder - “… very important work”.

  • International experts, as part of anonymous peer-review - “… challenges current thinking in the field”.

Four (4) submissions, authored by Dr Zernik and submitted under Human Rights Alert - NGO, were incorporated into UN Human Rights Council Periodic Reports regarding the US (2010, 2015) and Israel (2013, 2018).

The 2018 High Commissioner’s report on Israel included the following note:

"24. HRA-NGO highlighted the serious deterioration in integrity of law and justice agencies as a consequence of the implementation of e-government systems. It affirmed that the validity and integrity of any legal and judicial records of Israel should be deemed dubious at best."

His research has been presented and published in international academic conferences, including Data Mining (2010), Criminology (2012), E-government (2015, 2016, 2017, 2018), Cyber and Law (2018), Global Security (2019), and closed discussion panels in the Israeli Democracy Institute re: “Cyber Authority Bill” and “Fake Election”.

His work was also cited in a textbook on “Machine Learning”:

"Data mining of government records - particularly records of the justice system (i.e., courts, prisons) - enables the discovery of systemic human rights violations in connection to generation and publication of invalid or fraudulent legal records by various government agencies."

In 2018 he won a thank you note from the bureau of Supreme Court of Israel Presiding Justice for pointing her attention to the inexplicable disclaimer - “subject to editing and phrasing changes” - which appeared on all decisions of the Supreme Court from 2002 to that date.

In 2017 he won the right of public entry to the courtroom in Ayalon Prison complex, where hearings are held in matters pertaining to prisoners and detainees, without the 24 hour advance approval, imposed until then.

Human Rights Alert NGO

PO Box 33407, Tel-Aviv

Tel: 026236102  Fax: 077-3179186

©2019 by Joseph Zernik.