Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu recently declared that he would reverse parts of his judicial reform – but many in the country are unimpressed by this. In the evening, tens of thousands of people took to the streets in Tel Aviv and elsewhere.
In Israel, tens of thousands of people protested again in the evening against the controversial judicial reform. At the central rally in Tel Aviv, demonstrators chanted “democracy” while waving white and blue national flags.
Several participants rewrote the protest song “Bella Ciao” to “Bibi Ciao”. “Bibi” is the nickname of right-wing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. According to the organizers, around 150,000 people took part in the rally in the coastal city of Tel Aviv.
Dozens of demonstrators briefly blocked streets in the city. According to media reports, thousands took to the streets again in Jerusalem, Haifa and a number of other cities.
Fewer powers for the Supreme Court
The judicial reform has been causing protests in Israel for months. The governing coalition of Netanyahu’s conservative Likud party and ultra-right and ultra-Orthodox parties argues that the reform will restore balance in the separation of powers. She wants to specifically weaken the country’s highest court. The government accuses the judges of excessive interference in political decisions.
The demonstrators, on the other hand, see the country’s independent judiciary weakened by the planned reform and accuse the government of wanting to undermine democracy.
Netanyahu wants to give in
A few days ago, Netanyahu tried to appease: He had “discarded” a controversial part of the reform, he told the Wall Street Journal. Specifically, it is about a clause that allows Parliament to overturn the decisions of the Supreme Court with a simple majority. However, critics do not see this as a reversal of the reform, also because they believe there are many other problematic points on the government’s agenda.