Born in Jerusalem on 15 September 1923, Harish was educated in a yeshiva. He joined the Haganah, and volunteered for the British Army during World War II, before serving as an officer in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War.

He studied for bachelor's and master's degrees in law at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and began working as a magistrate. He became a judge in the Tel Aviv District court in 1969, and later became its vice-president. In 1986 Harish was appointed Attorney General.^[1] His predecessor Yitzhak Zamir had resigned after refusing to abandon an investigation into the activities of the head of Israel's GSS.^[2] A year later Harish set up the Landau Commission to investigate methods used by the GSS.

He left the post on 1 November 1993 and was replaced by Michael Ben-Yair.

Harish died on 6 November 2013. At the time of his death Harish resided in the Ramat Aviv area of Tel Aviv.