46 Following the first Facebook ruling, a series of decisions adopted its rationale and adhered to foreign choice of law clauses. However, the aforesaid obiter opinion has not yet been discussed broadly or adopted as a binding Supreme Court ruling. Recently, several District Court decisions have been published which adopted the obiter opinion in the first Facebook ruling. These decisions are not precedent-setting. In these cases, the foreign companies argued that the platforms’ servers and employees are not within Israel's borders, therefore they have no activity in Israel, and Israeli law should not apply to them – this argument was rejected. The Courts held that the fact that the platforms target Israeli consumers, operate their display in Hebrew, and enable the transaction to carry out in NIS, allows for the foreign companies to be considered as companies operating in Israel, and enables the application of the Consumer Protection Law in a non-extra-territorial manner. Thus, mandatory provisions of the Consumer Protection Law cannot be conditioned, not even indirectly, by setting a foreign choice of law clause. The parties’ consent to apply a foreign law should not be complied in every case, regardless of mandatory law, as this may encourage foreign companies to set oppressive choice of law clauses in their user agreements, while leaving Israeli consumers without protection. These rulings, in practice, narrowed the first Facebook ruling. Unlike the above-mentioned District Courts' decisions, there has been a District Court decision that expressed the view that the question regarding the status of the Consumer Protection Law on foreign companies was yet to be decided. In this case, the Court approved a settlement agreement in a class action that alleged the violation of the Consumer Protection Law by a foreign company. The Court emphasized that the legal standpoint was still unclear and acknowledged that the settlement contradicts the Consumer Protection Law. Nevertheless, the Court approved the settlement, holding that the settlement fulfills the purpose of the Class Action Law by allowing the parties to manage their risks related to the proceeding, including the risk that it may be determined that a choice of law clause can circumvent mandatory legislation. This ruling joined a number of other previous District Courts' decisions which expressed a similar position. 7. 8.
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