Libai, David
LIBAI, DAVID
LIBAI, DAVID (1934– ), Israeli politician, law professor, and criminal lawyer; member of the Eleventh to Fourteenth Knessets. Born in Tel Aviv, Libai received a B.A. in law from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 1961, an M.A. in law from the University of Chicago in 1967, and a doctorate the following year. In 1959–62 he served as spokesman in the Ministry of Justice when Pinhas *Rosen and Dov *Joseph were ministers of justice, and in the years 1960–63 as chief assistant to State Attorney Gideon *Hausner. He started to teach at Tel Aviv University in 1968. In 1971–73 he served as dean of students, and in 1971–88 as director of the Institute for the Training of Lawyers. In 1973–76 he headed the Institute for Criminology and Criminal Law. In 1975–82 he served as a member of the Press Council on behalf of the Labor Party; he was chairman of the Labor Party Constitution Committee in 1977–98. In 1978 he was appointed a member of the Knesset National Commission of Inquiry on Prison Conditions, and in 1982–84 he headed the Israel Bar Association.
Libai was first elected to the Knesset in 1984 on the Labor Alignment list. In the Eleventh and Twelfth Knessets he was chairman of the State Control Committee. In 1991–92 he was one of four Knesset members who presented bills for the direct election of the prime minister. In 1993–96 he served as minister of justice in the governments of Yitzhak *Rabin and Shimon *Peres. In 1995 he chaired a ministerial committee on the subject of the Arab villages of Ikrit and Bir'am in the upper Galilee, whose inhabitants had been forcefully evacuated during the War of Independence. The Committee recommended that inhabitants who had owned houses in the villages in 1948 could return to them, but that they would not be able to reclaim their lands. The recommendation was never implemented.
Libai resigned from the Knesset in October 1996, after a law was passed which prohibited Knesset members from holding additional positions, and returned to practicing criminal law, representing numerous well-known public figures, including the son of Prime Minister Ariel *Sharon, Gilad. Libai was chairman of the Council of Lawyers for a Constitution by Agreement as well as chairman of the Public Council in Israel that encourages cooperation between the Jewish and Arab sectors in Israel.
[Susan Hattis Rolef (2nd ed.)]