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Special Issues: Privilege and Confidentiality of Trustees - Chapter 16 - Trusts and Estate Planning in Israel - Second Edition
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This chapter is from Trusts and Estate Planning in Israel, Second Edition
PAGE PREVIEW 16.1. INTRODUCTION The term “trustee” is both a title and a description. The trustee is viewed as the individual responsible for the trust’s assets, and this also encompasses a duty to keep secret the information in his possession regarding the trust. In various legal rulings and academic articles, the question arises as to whether a trustee who is also an attorney enjoys absolute privilege. As part of the duty of loyalty that an attorney owes his client, Section 48 of the Evidence Ordinance states that matters and documents exchanged between an attorney and his client, or another person acting on behalf of the client, and that are materially related to the professional service provided by the attorney to the client, may not be handed over by the attorney as evidence, unless the client has waived privilege. Thus, attorneys in Israel enjoy absolute privilege, which forbids them from providing third parties with such “matters and documents.” An attorney who does transfer to a third party such “matters and documents” relating to his client risks the sanctions set out in the law. A trustee is required to protect the secrets of the trust from any third party, as part of his role in preserving the assets of the trust. This means that the trustee is bound by an obligation to safeguard secrets relating to the trust, where this is necessary to protect its affairs. This obligation applies, inter alia, to the executor of an estate, a legal guardian, and to a bailee in certain circumstances.
Dr. Alon Kaplan, Advocate & Notary, is a member of the Israel Bar and was admitted as a member of the New York and Frankfurt Bars. He is the President and founder of the Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners “STEP Israel”. Academically speaking, he has a Ph.D. from Zurich University in Switzerland and an LL.B. and LL.M. from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Dr. Kaplan maintains a direct and close relationship with academia, and he was a lecturer on trusts in the Academic Management College, Reichman University, and the Law Faculty of Tel Aviv University, where he taught trust courses for LL.M. students. Dr. Kaplan is a popular lecturer on trusts in Israel and abroad. He constructed the academic program for the Trusts Diploma of STEP in Israel. Throughout his professional career, he has written numerous professional articles in legal journals, on matters of trusts, intergenerational asset transfers and selected commercial law topics such as agent and distributor laws, a topic which he researched for his LL.M. thesis. Dr. Kaplan has been a regular contributor of articles to Trusts & Trustees by Oxford University Press. He has written and edited numerous professional books, among these on doing business in Israel, on trusts in Israel, and on international trusts laws. His book, Trusts and Estate Planning in Israel, is a professional and comprehensive guidebook for practitioners in this area in Israel. Another important book in English is Trusts in Prime Jurisdictions, fifth edition, 2020 which reviews trusts in various jurisdictions by 19 authors from various jurisdictions. In December 2020 he was the co-editor of the book, Life Cycle of a Family Business, published in London. Meytal Liberman, Advocate and Notary, TEP, advises private clients in Israel and internationally on trusts and estate planning. Her services include legal structuring for the long-term holding, ownership, and management of assets, addressing legal incapacity, division of marital property, wills, and trusts. She has practiced in this field since 2012, combining legal work, academic study, and active participation in professional organizations, publications, lectures, and continuing legal education.
Ms. Liberman was admitted to the Israel Bar in 2013 and licensed as a notary in 2024. She holds an LL.B. from Bar Ilan University (2012) and an LL.M. in Commercial Law from Tel Aviv University (2015). She is a full member of STEP, having earned a Diploma in International Trust Management following two years of study. Since 2018, she has been authorized by the Administrator General and the Israel Bar Association to draft and execute legal instruments for future incapacity planning, including the Enduring Power of Attorney, Expression of Wishes Document, and Preliminary Instructions for the Appointment of a Guardian. Her writing includes chapters in Asia-Pacific Trusts Law, Volume 2 (Bloomsbury, 2022), Trusts in Prime Jurisdictions (5th ed., Globe Law and Business, 2019), and Trust in Israel: Theory and Practice (2017, in Hebrew). Her work has also appeared in Trusts & Trustees, The International Family Office Journal, and STEP Journal. She lectures regularly at seminars and conferences, including events hosted by the Israel Bar Association and STEP.
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