The basic approach of Israeli law remains an adversary and accusative system. The last two decades, however, have witnessed changes that warrant examination as to their effects upon the rules of evidence and criminal procedure. The changes in criminal litigation have seen the reduction in some traditional rights of the defendant and the granting of new procedural tools for the prosecution in easing the task of proving the defendant's guilt. Another change has been the relative weight and importance given in judicial decisions to the inquisitional pretrial process and to the trial proceeding dominated by the adversarial process. As a result of these developments, the defendant's status under Israeli law has worsened. Most of the changes derive from new social perspectives of the appropriate methods for contending with crime and from a change in the perception of the judicial role and the judge's part in the truth-seeking process. 170 notes.