Anyone go to law school in israel?

Has anyone either been to law school or work as a lawyer in israel? My husband is thinking about law school in israel (we want to make aliyah) and I was wondering if anyone can give me info about it. does the government pay for law school if someone makes aliyah (the way they pay for either a bachelor's or masters degree if u are under a certain age and made aliyah)? how much does a lawyer get paid in israel? how hard is it to find a job there? I'd rather not reveal who I am b/c its not public that we want to make aliyah so I'm anon. But I need any advice I can get.
Thanx

Platinum Member Joined: Aug 12 2007 Posts: 20496

Actually tamiri, a first year lawyer in a big firm in the US makes around 170k. In Israel it's the equivalent of 20-25k aiui.

Platinum Member Joined: Aug 12 2007 Posts: 20496

Platinum Member Joined: Aug 12 2007 Posts: 20496

From googling beginner lawyers salaries in Israel, I came up with a span of 4500-7000 nis/month. Starvation wages, and sometimes less than a clerk/secretary. OTOH, you don't have massive student loans to repay here. So the high end is just around $21k/annum. Before taxes Shocked

DH is a lawyer.
In Israel law is really a BA program (sometimes they get an LLB).
DH studied at Bar Ilan there it is a three and a half year program, other places you can only do three years (maybe less in some colleges also if you already have a BA you may get credit). Then you do two years (this is new policy not yet implemented but would be relevant for you) of paid internship (low pay usually). After that you go for the bar. Law is not as lucrative in Israel as it is in the US, although, if you're good and work in a nice big firm you can do pretty well (really well). English speaking lawyers, are saught for business with US.
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Platinum Member Joined: Jan 01 2006 Posts: 48153

The schooling is in Hebrew, right? How is OP's husband going to be able to do that ?

Posted: Sun, Aug 01 2010, 5:49 pm Post subject:

Silver Member Joined: Nov 02 2009 Posts: 633

VERY few law students graduate and get jobs with white shoe law firms and make 170,000 a year. For one thing, you have to have gone to a top ten school and be in the top 10% of your class. Much more common is a starting salary in the region of $40,000-$50,000 (in a small regional firm or in legal aid or other government work), that is if you land a job. Otherwise it's document review making $20/hour with no benefits. Or work another job and practice part time while trying to build a practice and keep a roof over your head.
I'm in my last semester of law school, so I know the situation very well.

Gold Member Joined: Mar 16 2009 Posts: 2291

If your dh is smart, does well, and especially if he's interested in more business-type law, it's very worthwhile.

It is in fact easier to get into law school in Israel than into a psych program for BA, not even talking about graduate school. It does require high SATS/psychometry, but not as bad as for psych or medicine. If he wants to/can afford to study at smaller/more expensive "colleges", SATs don't need to be as high. AFAIK even if he has a BA getting accepted is still mostly based on SATs.

Lawyers starting out in the US who went to decent-good-excellent schools make lots more than $100K first year out of law school. If they can get a job, that is. I happen to know lots of people who went to Harvard Law School, and bunches of those who graduated a year ago had their job offers rescinded or postponed to a January start because of the economy. Not sure what's happening with the new crop of grads.

Platinum Member Joined: Aug 12 2007 Posts: 20496