When 60 days in detention allow bail, what counts as non-cooperation under section 13ו(ב), and what the Authority must do with the consulate. A practical guide.
The Entry into Israel Law, 5712-1952 sets a time limit: a person held in immigration detention (custody) for more than 60 consecutive days falls within the list of cases in which release on bail is possible. In practice, for a considerable number of detainees, day sixty-one passes with nothing changing. The explanation heard at the hearing is almost always the same: the detainee refused to sign a request for the issuance of a travel document, failed to produce a passport he claimed to have, or gave contradictory accounts of his identity — and therefore, so the argument goes, he himself is delaying his own removal.
This page is intended for anyone held in detention beyond 60 days, and for their family members. It explains exactly what the law says about the 60 days, what the non-cooperation exception is and what falls within it, what the Detention Review Tribunal is and is not authorized to do, and what is required so that detention does not become unlimited in time. The content is written as general information, and every case is examined on its own merits.
Section 13ו(א) of the Entry into Israel Law sets out a closed list of situations in which the border-control officer may release an unlawful resident on bail: unlawful presence rooted in a good-faith mistake or malfunction (paragraph (1)); being persuaded that the person will leave on his own by an appointed date and that there will be no difficulty locating him (paragraph (2)); age, health condition, or special humanitarian reasons (paragraph (3)); and finally paragraph (4) — "he has been held in detention for more than 60 consecutive days."
Immediately after it comes the exception. Section 13ו(ב) provides that an unlawful resident will not be released on bail if "his removal from Israel is prevented or delayed due to the absence of his full cooperation, including with regard to clarifying his identity or arranging the procedures for his removal from Israel" (paragraph (1)), or if his release would endanger state security, public safety, or public health (paragraph (2)). Section 13ו(ג) adds that release is always conditioned on terms and on bail to secure appearance.
Two conclusions follow. First, 60 days is not an automatic key: the Supreme Court held that the law should not be interpreted as requiring automatic release once 60 days have passed (Leave to Appeal (Supreme Court) 173/03 (9 May 2005)). Second, once one of the exceptions in section 13ו(ב) is met, the tribunal is barred from ordering release — even if it found a justified ground for release, as stated in the Detention Review Tribunal decision of 7 Aug 2024.
Procedure 10.3.0001 (Procedure for Issuing Removal and Detention Orders under the Entry into Israel Law, 5712-1952), 4th edition of 15 Mar 2023, sets out the first stages. Clause ג.4 requires a hearing before the border-control officer no later than seven hours after the resident's arrival at the unit's facilities; clause ד.1.7 requires informing the person of the right to consult a lawyer and to be represented at the hearing; clause ו.1.1 provides that the decision on removal will be given no later than 24 hours after detention begins; and clause ו.1.5 provides that a person will not be removed before three days have passed from delivery of the removal order, unless he asked to leave earlier and confirmed this in writing.
After that, judicial review begins. The detainee is brought before the Detention Review Tribunal within 96 hours of the start of detention, under section 13יד of the law, and from there his case is reviewed again periodically: section 13טו(א)(1) authorizes the tribunal to confirm the order and direct that the detainee's case be brought before it again for further review, provided that the period until that review does not exceed 30 days. This is how the 30-day hearings arise, and it is around the third hearing that the 60-day line is crossed.
Clause ד.2.7 of the procedure is where most of the dispute grows from: if the resident does not hold a valid travel document, he is given application forms for a laissez-passer to his country, and if he refuses to fill them out, the refusal is recorded in the hearing protocol and accompanies the file at every subsequent hearing.
Case law lists several distinct types of conduct: refusing to sign travel documents or an application for their issuance, failing to produce a passport the detainee claims to hold, giving contradictory or false identity details, and physically thwarting a deportation-flight attempt. The Supreme Court has clarified that whether removal is possible is examined by an objective standard: a person who by his own actions frustrates his removal cannot argue that removal is impossible, since the 'keys' to his release are in his own hands — even if he persists in his refusal over a long period (Leave to Appeal (Supreme Court) 5815/18 (5 Sep 2018), citing Supreme Court Administrative Appeal 8101/15 (2017)).
On the other hand, not every missing document amounts to non-cooperation. Refusal is not the same as inability: a consulate that does not hold identification meetings, a country of origin with no active representation, a stateless person, or someone who provides his details in full but whose identity cannot be verified for reasons beyond his control — all of these differ from someone who refuses to sign. A delay originating with the foreign party can also be shown: in the Detention Review Tribunal decision of 16 Aug 2026 it emerged that the consul himself was not responding to the Authority's inquiries and that the matter had been referred to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs — a fact that is not held against the detainee.
The non-cooperation exception does not relieve the Authority of the need to make an effort. In Leave to Appeal (Supreme Court) 696/06 (2006), it was held that strict and consistent administrative review of how the power is exercised is required, examining two sides: whether the detainee, by his conduct, is still preventing or delaying his removal, and, on the other hand, whether the state is doing everything it can to carry out the removal, including whether it can be carried out even without his cooperation. Where one of these conditions is not met, the competent authority must consider release on bail on suitable terms (as quoted in Leave to Appeal (Supreme Court) 5815/18).
This is the line the hearing should be steered toward, because the Authority itself operates a track for issuing a travel document without cooperation. The Detention Review Tribunal decision of 10 May 2026 reported an advanced process with the South Sudanese consulate to obtain a travel document despite the detainee's refusal to sign, even though the process was taking much longer than usual. Once such a track exists, the question becomes factual: when it was activated, what has been done under it, and what the realistic prospect is. At the hearing of 21 Sep 2025, the tribunal asked the officer's representative why, by that date, no document had been issued through the non-cooperation track, and the answer was that the track had been activated only after it became clear there was no passport.
Detention is not punitive; its purpose is to secure actual removal. Case law holds that an unlawful resident will not be kept in immigration detention (custody) if no effective removal process is under way in his case, or if no prospect of his deportation is visible on the horizon. As time drags on, the question of exactly what is expected to happen, and when, carries increasing weight. The District Court sitting as the Court for Administrative Affairs in Tel Aviv addressed this in Adm. Appeal (Tel Aviv) 42777-06-25 (26 Jun 2025): the rule is release once 60 days have passed, the rule is subject to the statutory exceptions, and in any event detention should not exceed a period that departs from what is reasonable. In that case, a person who had been held in detention for 142 days was released against a cash deposit and conditions.
The starkest example is Leave to Appeal (Supreme Court) 5815/18: a person was held in detention for more than five years, consistently refused to return to his country, and thwarted five deportation-flight attempts — yet his time-limited release on conditions was approved, after the tribunal found that at that stage detention no longer contributed to removal. The Supreme Court did not change the rule that no one may benefit from the fruits of his own frustration of the process, but it declined to intervene in the lower instances' assessment that time-limited release might actually promote cooperation.
In the Detention Review Tribunal decision of 21 Sep 2025, concerning a person who had been in detention for 82 days, the officer's representative argued that the detainee was 'attempting to frustrate his removal' and remained 'beyond 60 days against a background of a complete absence of cooperation': he first claimed to have a passport, and after none was found, refused to sign an application for a travel document. The tribunal confirmed the detention relying on Leave to Appeal (Supreme Court) 173/03, but required the officer to report, by a set date, the actual prospect for removal. The lesson: even when detention is confirmed, it is worth asking for a fixed timetable and concrete reporting.
In a decision of 12 Aug 2025, concerning a detainee held for more than 60 days, it was held that failure to produce a passport combined with a refusal to sign travel documents establishes the exception under section 13ו(ב)(1). It was also held there that a judicial order staying removal, obtained through proceedings brought by the detainee himself, does not by itself justify release — otherwise the key to release would be in his own hands. The lesson: pursuing proceedings against the removal order does not, by itself, create a ground for release.
In a decision of 16 Aug 2026, concerning a detainee transferred to detention after serving a prison sentence for a serious violent offense and who had refused for about a year to sign travel documents, detention was confirmed also on the ground of dangerousness under section 13ו(ב)(2). However, the tribunal added that, given the long duration and the absence of concrete updates on the prospect of removal, the possibility of release on conditions would be considered if there was no progress. The lesson: time and the absence of a horizon work in the detainee's favor even in a serious case.
Finally, in Adm. Appeal (Central) 42497-06-25 (23 Jun 2025), the Court for Administrative Affairs allowed an appeal and ordered release, after removal had not been carried out for reasons not attributable to the detainee. The conditions included weekly reporting, providing an address and contact details, an undertaking to cooperate with the deportation-flight arrangements, a deposit of NIS 20,000, and a third-party guarantee by an Israeli resident in the amount of NIS 30,000.
It is important to distinguish between two orders. The detention order is examined by the Detention Review Tribunal; the removal order is challenged by way of an appeal to the Appeals Tribunal for immigration matters under the Entry into Israel Law. The Detention Review Tribunal has no authority to rule on the validity of the removal order, nor even to stay it, as was expressly held in the Detention Review Tribunal decision of 7 Aug 2024, relying on Supreme Court case law. A decision of the Detention Review Tribunal may be appealed to the District Court sitting as the Court for Administrative Affairs within 45 days of receiving the decision.
In practical terms, ahead of the hearing around day 60 it is worth preparing on four fronts. First, clearly and documentedly declaring willingness to cooperate from that point on — signing the travel-document application forms, providing full identity details, and appearing for a meeting with a consular representative. Second, asking the border-control officer for a concrete answer on what has been done under the non-cooperation travel-document track, since when, and what the prospect is. Third, pointing to delays originating with the foreign party or with the system, rather than with the detainee. Fourth, proposing a real alternative: a fixed residential address, a financial bail, a guarantor who is an Israeli resident, periodic reporting, and an undertaking to leave Israel within a set period.
The issue of release on bail and its conditions, as well as release on medical and humanitarian grounds under section 13ו(א)(3), are discussed at length in separate guides on our site.
Our office accompanies detainees and their families through judicial review hearings at detention facilities and through appeals to the Court for Administrative Affairs. We review the hearing protocol and the border-control officer's updates throughout the detention period, identify the gap between the non-cooperation claim and what has actually been done with the consulate, draft a cooperation declaration and a tailored proposed bail alternative, and file the appropriate proceeding — before the Detention Review Tribunal, before the Appeals Tribunal in relation to the removal order, or by way of an administrative appeal. In every case the outcome depends on its particular circumstances, and we do not guarantee a result.
Not automatically. Section 13ו(א)(4) of the Entry into Israel Law provides that being held for more than 60 consecutive days is one of the grounds on which release on bail is possible, but the power is discretionary. The Supreme Court held that the law should not be interpreted as creating a duty to release automatically once 60 days have passed (Leave to Appeal (Supreme Court) 173/03 (9 May 2005)). As time drags on, more weight is given to the absence of a removal horizon.
Refusing to sign travel documents or an application for their issuance is treated in case law as non-cooperation, and it triggers the exception under section 13ו(ב)(1) of the law. As long as the exception applies, the tribunal is barred from ordering release even if a ground for release exists. However, the refusal is not irreversible going forward: a documented declaration of willingness to sign and to appear from that point on changes the picture before the tribunal.
Not necessarily. The exception speaks of removal being prevented or delayed 'due to the absence of full cooperation' on the detainee's part — that is, his own conduct, not external circumstances. Genuine inability, such as the lack of available representation or an identification difficulty on the consulate's side, is not the same as refusal. In the decisions reviewed here, more than once the delay was found to lie at the consulate's door, and this is a fact that should be presented explicitly at the hearing.
Alongside the detainee's conduct, the tribunal also examines whether the state is doing everything it can to carry out the removal and whether it can be carried out without cooperation (Leave to Appeal (Supreme Court) 696/06 (2006), as quoted in Leave to Appeal (Supreme Court) 5815/18 (5 Sep 2018)). In practice, the tribunal tends to ask why a travel document has not yet been issued through the track that does not require a signature, to require an update on the prospect for removal, and to set a date for a further hearing no more than 30 days away.
A decision of the Detention Review Tribunal may be appealed to the District Court sitting as the Court for Administrative Affairs within 45 days of receiving the decision. It is important to remember that the Detention Review Tribunal has no authority to rule on the removal order or to stay it — challenging the removal order is done through a separate appeal to the Appeals Tribunal, and sometimes both proceedings must be filed in parallel.