The laws of the Old-Babylonian kingdom of Eshnunna (LE) were discovered in 1945 and 1947, on two parallel tablets, during excavations on the outskirts of Baghdad. In 1948 a first edition, with English translation, was published by Professor Albrecht Goetze, of Yale University. Since then the LE have been translated into many languages, major and minor, and a considerable literature has grown up around them. Goetze himself has repeatedly returned to the Laws of Eshnunna. His standard edition of the LE, now in general use by scholars, was published in 1956.

Eshnunna, to the east of the river Tigris, flourished during the early second millennium B.C. Much of its history is as yet uncertain. Here it will suffice to note that it finally fell victim to the expansionist policies pursued with success by Hammurabi of Babylon, during the fourth decade of his reign. The date of promulgation of the LE is uncertain, but it is at least agreed that they precede the Code of Hammurabi, though one cannot know by how much. It is then a fair guess that they were issued in the course of the 18th century B.C.; thus they constitute the earliest collection known at present, of legal rules in Akkadian.

The characteristic function of private international law is to declare the law applying to cases containing a foreign element, by pointing out the general principles upon which all the legislation on the matter is based and developed. The function of such principles is to help to specify the law considered appropriate in individual cases. Private international law knows several such principles such as domicile, nationality, the will of the parties, the place where a contract is concluded or where an immovable is situated, etc.

Conflict of personal laws is also based on connecting principles, although of a different character. The main connecting principle is the ethnic or religious association of the parties. Nationality or domicile of the parties, the two connecting principles on which the main systems of private international law are based, may not be resorted to in the conflict of personal laws. Nationality may be taken as a basis for deciding which is the most appropriate law to be applied to the relationships between nationals of different States, but not for deciding which law is to be applied to parties who, being members of different legal systems, are nevertheless all nationals of the same State. As to domicile, it may help to solve a similar problem arising between persons domiciled in different countries or between persons domiciled in different parts of the same country within which different territorial laws are in force; but it can serve no useful purpose in relation to nationals of the same State to whom different laws apply by reason of their ethnic or religious origin and who live scattered throughout the whole of the territory of the State.

On May 28, 1967, one Solomon Hamatprest voluntarily presented himself before the military authority, after having failed for a number of years to report for registration and medical examination as required by a notice published under the Defence Service Law, 1959 (hereafter called the Law). Omission to fulfil a duty imposed by this law constitutes an offence punishable by two years imprisonment under section 5(a) (1) of the law; and where such offence is committed “with intent to evade defence service”, the maximum penalty is increased by section 35(b) (1) to five years prison.

Before the Six Day War those who shirked defence service had consistently been charged with the lesser offence. But in the wake of the War this offence had been covered by an Amnesty Law; and that was probably why Hamatprest, among others, had been committed for trial under the alternative graver offence, involving “intent to evade defence service”, which had been explicitly excluded from the amnesty.

To claim that the Land Law, 1969 is the most significant private law enactment to have been promulgated hitherto by the Knesset may perhaps be regarded as somewhat of anexaggeration. Nevertheless, it would seem incontrovertible that this statute is at any rate among the most basic and extensive to have been enacted by the Knesset in the realm ofprivate law. In order to appreciate the particular importance of this statute it is sufficient to consider two provisions thereof, namely, the abolition of recourse to English law as a source for complementing the local law in all matters relating to land; and, secondly, the repeal of the Ottoman land legislation. Some preliminary remarks may be of assistance in appreciating the full import of these two provisions.