A longtime member of the law faculty at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Professor Gavison was well-known for her contributions to political and legal philosophy. I will add links to memorial notices as they appear.
(Thanks to Alon Harel for alerting me to her passing.)
UPDATE: Professor Harel kindly gave permission to share this remembrance he wrote:
Ruth Gavison was my teacher and I owe my interest in philosophy to her enthusiastic and energetic teaching style. She also encouraged me to apply for graduate studies abroad and created the contact between me and Professor Joseph Raz who later became my supervisor. So I can praise her (or blame her) for my chosen career path.
Academically she has written breakthrough articles on the issues of privacy and the distinction between the private and the public sphere. She later also published extensively on questions of ethnic diversity, inter-religious conflicts, nationalism and democracy in the Israeli context and her writings have had major influence internationally and locally.
She is known to the Israeli public for her political activism and for her major contributions to Israeli political life. In 1972 she joined the Association of Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) which was at the time a small organization composed of a few volunteer. Under her guidance it has become the most important human rights organization in Israel. She served as the chairperson for many years and later the founding President of ACRI. In 2005 she established Mezila -- an organization devoted to a reconciliation between humanism and Zionism in Israel. These two organizations reflect the inherent tensions in her personality between her commitment to the ideal of Zionism on the one hand and her commitment to liberal rights and humanism on the other. These tensions in her personality gave rise to many bitter controversies between her and many other activists. Some members of ACRI regarded her positions as unacceptable. But Ruth Gavison never feared controversy and was committed to pursuing the ideals that she believed in even at the cost of alienating her friends and allies. She was a free spirit; she could never be easily categorized as being a right or a left wing person. She was simply Rutie --- an independent thinker who did not fit any pre-established classifications.
She will be missed by her friends and admirers but I also believe by her enemies as even in the most bitter controversies she remained loyal to rigorous standards of argumentations and debate. I definitely will miss her insatiable pursuit of justice.
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