Michael Sfard was born in 1972 in the Rehov Brazil public housing complex in
Kiryat HaYovel,
Jerusalem. Sfard is the grandchild of Holocaust survivor
Zygmunt Bauman. His parents had been expelled from Poland for their involvement in the
University of Warsaw student uprisings against the Communist Government in 1968. When he was five, his family moved to an apartment building in
Ma'alot Dafna that was home to many journalists. He was a reservist for the
Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) in the
Gaza Strip while at law school. He served in the
Nahal Brigade of the IDF, mostly in Lebanon, as a military paramedic. According to Sfard, before his reserve duty in Gaza, he believed "left-wing soldiers" should agree to patrol the Palestinian territories "to stop bad things from happening" rather than be conscientious objectors. He was released from the army in 1994 and attended a course on Jewish-Arab encounters at
Neve Shalom. He started his legal apprenticeship with
Avigdor Feldman in 1998 and worked with him for several years as an attorney.
The Independent and
The Observer. Sfard is the grandson of
sociologist Zygmunt Bauman and writer
Janina Bauman on his mother's side and of
Communist Yiddish author David Sfard and Cinema Studies Professor Regina Dreyer on his father's side. His father Leon is a mathematician and his mother
Anna Sfard is a Professor of Mathematics Education in the Department of Education at the
University of Haifa.
Legal activities Sfard has represented a variety of
Israeli and
Palestinian human rights and peace organizations, movements and activists at the
Israeli Supreme Court. Sfard is legal counsel for
Peace Now. Cases which Sfard has handled include: • Sfard filed a petition on behalf of a group of Israeli Human Rights organizations against the IDF decision to reduce the size of the humanitarian "safety zone" during bombardments of Gaza. • Sfard has litigated a case on behalf of the Israeli human rights organization
Hamoked, against the "permit system" which governs the area between the
separation fence and the
1949 armistice line. • Sfard represented
Peace Now in a petition against settlement outposts. Sfard litigated the case for the demolition of nine houses built illegally on Palestinian private land, in the outpost known as "
Amona". He also litigated the case n which Peace Now demands to evacuate an outpost called "
Migron". • A case involving the
International Solidarity Movement's
Brian Avery, who was wounded during the course of his activities in
Jenin. Avery was injured in the head by IDF soldiers. Avery accepted a settlement for NIS 600,000 (US$150,000) from the state of Israel in exchange for dropping the lawsuit. Shlomo Lecker was his Israeli lawyer and Sfard represented him as well. • Sfard and co-counsel Carmel Pomerantz, represented 17
Bedouin, who lived near
Beer Sheva, claiming the land they were on, including
Al-Araqeeb, belonged to them rather than to the State of Israel. The judge ruled in favor of the State saying that the land was not "assigned to the plaintiffs, nor held by them under conditions required by law" and that they still had to "prove their rights to the land by proof of its registration in the
Tabu". Furthermore, the judge said that the Bedouin knew they were supposed to register, but didn't, saying "although the complainants are not entitled to compensation, it has been willing to negotiate with them…it is a shame that these negotiations did not reach any agreement." The court ordered the Bedouins to pay legal costs of NIS 50,000. • Defense of Jonathan (Yoni) Ben Artzi who refused to enlist for military service. Ben Artzi considered himself a pacifist and total conscientious objector and therefore objected to serving in the army in any capacity. ==Reception==