Recent Developments in Israel Criminal Law

Abstract

Criminal liability, in the widest sense has its periods of ebb and flow; thus for a certain length of time it may extend over a greater field of human behaviour and then may withdraw and permit forms of conduct formerly regarded as criminal to be no longer so regarded.Looking at recent developments in Israeli substantive criminal law it appears that we are now in a period of “flow”, which finds its expression in various forms, namely:1) The adoption by the courts of less strict canons of interpretation of criminal legislation;2) The application of general doctrines, especially those of attempt, conspiracy and complicity more widely than before;3) The narrowing down of certain defences;4) The creation of new offences or the amending of existing offences with a view to covering modes of conduct which have not, in the past, been subject to criminal law.5) The broadening of the spatial (or territorial) application of the criminal law. This is generally expressed in Israel—according to English tradition—in terms of the jurisdiction of the courts, but in actual fact it is not a procedural matter but relates to the question of the breadth of the criminal law itself.