Background
The second applicant, a Philippine citizen, entered Israel in 2004 and held a periodically renewed work permit until 2009. In 2011, she and the first applicant, an Israeli citizen, applied to regularize her status under the Population and Immigration Authority’s procedure for unmarried partners of Israelis. She was still married when the application was filed and supplied her divorce documents in 2015.
The Authority denied the application principally because the first applicant remained married, appeared to maintain a form of intimate relationship with his Israeli wife while living with the second applicant, and had not shown genuine efforts to complete his divorce. The Appeals Tribunal rejected the applicants’ administrative appeal, and the Jerusalem District Court, sitting as a Court for Administrative Affairs, dismissed their further appeal. They then sought permission to appeal to the Supreme Court.
After the Supreme Court raised difficulties concerning the reasons underlying the original denial, the parties agreed that the applicants would submit a new application. The Authority denied that application in September 2025, finding that the relationship’s genuineness had not been established and that the first applicant continued to have an intimate relationship with his wife. In July 2026, the applicants asked to discontinue the Supreme Court proceeding because the second applicant had decided to leave Israel and return to the Philippines, making her status request unnecessary.
The Court’s Holding
The Supreme Court deleted the application for permission to appeal. Because the second applicant had left Israel and withdrawn her request for status, there was no longer a basis to continue adjudicating the proceeding.
The Court ordered the applicants to pay NIS 2,500 in costs to the State Treasury. It said it was uncomfortable with the factual picture that had recently emerged concerning the applicants’ conduct, including information that the second applicant had given birth in 2018 to a child whom the first applicant had not fathered, after she had previously denied that fact. At the same time, the Court imposed costs only at a reduced level because difficulties remained concerning the original grounds for denying status, including in light of the current record and the approximately 15-year duration of the proceedings.
Key Takeaways
- A request for permission to appeal over immigration status may be deleted when the foreign applicant leaves Israel and no longer seeks the requested status.
- The Court did not decide whether the Authority’s denial of status was lawful or whether the applicants’ relationship was genuine.
- The applicants were ordered to pay NIS 2,500 to the State Treasury, but the Court reduced the amount while noting that difficulties remained concerning the original grounds for denial and that the proceedings had lasted about 15 years.
Why It Matters
The decision illustrates that a material change in circumstances can end judicial review of an immigration-status dispute without a ruling on the merits. Departure from Israel and abandonment of the underlying status request left no live claim for the Supreme Court to resolve.
It also shows the Court preserving its earlier reservations about the original reasons for denial while declining to decide them after the case became unnecessary. The result therefore should not be read as affirming either the Authority’s factual findings or its legal approach to unmarried-partner applications.