The Council of The Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities wishes to express its grave concern and strong reservations regarding the government’s intention to change the Law of the National Library of Israel, by the initiative of the Minister of Education, and regarding the damage to the library’s status as an independent institution.

The Council issues this statement by virtue of the Academy’s role, as set down by law, to advise the government on matters of science and research in Israel, as well as on the basis of the National Library Law of 2007, which states that the President of The Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities serves as the chairperson of the National Library of Israel’s Council, whose duties include appointing members of the board of directors.

The National Library of Israel has a special and central place in Israeli culture, as well as in the position of the Israel as a world-wide cultural center in the fields of Jewish Studies and the Humanities. As a center for Jewish, Moslem, and global cultural treasures since the early twentieth century, the National Library of Israel serves as a unique research infrastructure and a focal point for scholars in the various fields of knowledge in the Humanities and Social Sciences.

Trnasferring the role of appointing the board of directors from an independent public council to the hands of a government minister constitutes blatant interference with the library’s independence, in that it clearly renders the library subordinate to the political echelon. In addition to causing irreversible damage to the treasures of Jewish and Israeli knowledge, such a change will harm the trust of the donors and partners in the Library’s work in Israel and abroad, who based their donations on the Library’s status as a research infrastructure managed solely on the basis of scientific excellence, free from political considerations.

The National Library of Israel holds more than five million books and periodicals, as well as thousands of other items in special collections, including old manuscripts, archives, maps, musical recordings, and digital collections. The continued promotion of the change to the National Library Law could lead to the withdrawal of collections from the library and of donations promised to it for the purpose of its activity – and, at the end of the day, perhaps even to the actual dismantling of the library.