Tens of thousands of Israelis protest against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s judicial overhaul plan outside the parliament on Monday in Jerusalem. Associated Press photo
TEL AVIV — When Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced a temporary suspension of his government’s contentious judicial overhaul, many Israelis gave a sigh of relief.
For critics, who say that the plan would have destroyed Israel’s only system of checks and balances and slide it toward dictatorship, there would be several weeks for the opposition to attempt to negotiate on its more egregious elements, like giving Knesset members leverage over Supreme Court judges. For supporters, who say the initiative would finally break an elite stronghold on the Supreme Court, it is just preparing for round two.
“The right has stopped sitting on the sidelines and staying silent,” tweeted the far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir.
Netanyahu has not addressed the avalanche of questions that preceded Monday’s dramatic announcement, in which he said that he would enter negotiations with the opposition while still planning to move the controversial bills through the Knesset after the Passover break next month. He has also not yet addressed the dismissal of his defense minister, Yoav Gallant, on Sunday night, which was made in response to Gallant’s urging to halt the judicial overhaul.
“One way or another, we will enact a reform that will restore the balance between the authorities that has been lost, by preserving – and I add, even by strengthening – individual rights,” Netanyahu said in the Monday speech. “We have the Knesset majority to do this alone, with immense support among the people.”
Many in the opposition say Netanyahu is already acting in bad faith.
On Tuesday morning, the coalition took several bureaucratic steps to advance the bill on the judges’ appointment, which would allow it to be put to a vote within a day, once the negotiations end.
Opposition lawmaker Orna Barbivai, part of centrist Yesh Atid party’s negotiation team, told Army Radio on Tuesday that her team would sit down with Netanyahu, but “with open eyes.”
“Me and Netanyahu – there’s absolutely no trust,” she said. “I don’t believe that man.”
Israeli police use a water cannon to disperse demonstrators blocking a highway during a protest against plans by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government to overhaul the judicial system on Monday in Tel Aviv, Israel. Oren Ziv/Associated Press
On Sunday, the government is also planning to propose a “national guard” under the control of Ben Gvir, who received the promise after reportedly threatening to quit the coalition several times over the decision to pause the overhaul.
The move would give one of Israel’s most extremist leaders a measure of military power.
Former Israel police head Moshe Karadi, in a news conference Tuesday, warned the force would be a “private militia to serve his political needs.”
Ben Gvir, a once fringe far-right lawmaker, was convicted dozens of times on charges that include support for terrorist groups and has long sought an officially sanctioned force directly under his control.
In May 2021, when Jewish and Arab gangs clashed in Israel’s mixed cities, Ben Gvir led hundreds of volunteer West Bank settlers to “patrol” the streets, where they clashed violently with Palestinian Israelis.
Israeli police commissioner Kobi Shabtai, now subordinate to Ben Gvir, said the “internal intifada” was partly the fault of Ben Gvir for goading on the renegade settlers.
Israelis protest against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s judicial overhaul plan outside the parliament on Monday in Jerusalem. Ohad Zwigenberg/Associated Press
Concessions to Ben Gvir may also be a first sign that Netanyahu is aiming to buy time and suppress the dissent, rather than address some of the concerns of the past three months of mass protests.
For his part, Ben Gvir pledged that the push to remake the courts would resume. “No one will scare us. No one will succeed in changing the people’s decision,” he tweeted on Monday.
He later praised the masses of right-wing protesters who came out Monday night, who, he said, would not accept “that our vote is second class.”
He did not comment on a string of violent attacks carried out by some members of that same group, including one incident, in which a Palestinian taxi driver was “savagely attacked by the rioters who chased him and caused heavy damage to his car,” according to an Israeli police statement.
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