To understand what is going on in Israel, especially the prevalent mood in the country, requires more than a brief visit or chat with Israeli friends. Quick glances often reveal only yesterday's agenda instead of that of today and tomorrow. For example, on the surface, it appears that Israel's leadership and government are a corrupt group of individuals who have taken over the country for their own personal gain.

The prime minister, defense minister, finance minister, justice minister, police chief, and entire senior administration of the tax authority all are under investigation for criminal offenses. (So is the president of Israel, but that's a completely different story.) But, as much of the Israeli public already realizes, this is not because the current leadership is made of a lesser moral fiber than leaders of the past. The reason lies elsewhere.

In the past few years, the strength of Israel's legal establishment has grown disproportionately. Led by the former president of the Supreme Court, who declared that "everything can be brought to trial," and a government comptroller, who is constantly searching for questionable acts to curb, open season has been declared not only on the Israeli leadership, but also on anybody who can generate a headline.

Israel's Supreme Court not only wants to bring everything to trial, but also wants to turn all levels of the judicial system into an exclusive club in which it controls admissions decisions. All attempts to appoint new supreme court justices who think differently than the old guard have been blocked. Any attempt to reform or change the legal system has been stopped dead in its tracks.

When Tsipi Livni, while serving as justice minister, tried to nominate Prof. Ruth Gavison to the Supreme Court, the honorable justices ganged up against her. Haim Ramon, who was nominated justice minister after Livni, also thought that reforms were necessary in the legal system. Lo and behold, Ramon found himself on trial for kissing a female assistant  in his office. The state prosecutor's office pressured the assistant to file a complaint and then indicted the minister. All the evidence that Ramon submitted to show that the affair could be, at its worst, declared an innocent mistake was thrown out of court - including a photograph showing the girl with her arms around Ramon's belly in a very amorous pose. Ramon was found guilty - just like 75% of the defendants in court cases brought to trial in Israel.

When Prime Minister Ehud Olmert decided to nominate the esteemed law  professor Daniel Friedman to the post of minister of justice, the legal establishment gathered forces again to block the nomination. Friedman is known for his criticism of the legal establishment, which he calls "the rule of law gang." After Ramon's trial, he published an article in Israel's leading daily denouncing the decision to find Ramon guilty and criticizing the fact that the affair was ever brought to trial.

The Supreme Court club opened its attack on the nomination by sending Supreme Court Justice Emeritus Michael Cheshin to denounce the nomination. "I will cut off the hand of anyone who dares to lay a hand on the Supreme Court," he declared, as if the justices were the ones who nominated government ministers. But then, if anything can be brought to trial, then the court can have a say in anything, including the purely political act of nominating a minister.

The public in Israel is beginning to believe that something is wrong not with the government but with the courts. In a recent poll, the majority of Israelis said they had no faith in the Israeli justice system.

These days, one often hears that Israel is rapidly becoming a South American banana republic. But the source of this perception is not the "corruption" of the state, but the concept of legal activism which was introduced by Aharon Barak, the  Supreme Court president emeritus who declared that everything can by brought to trial.