With a solemn appeal and a call for a general strike, the president of Israel and the country’s great trade union center on Monday asked the government of Benjamin Netanyahu stop the judicial reform project, which on Sunday night generated new demonstrations of rejection.
“The entire nation is deeply concerned. Our security, our economy and our society are threatened,” said President Isaac Herzog.
“In the name of the unity of the people of Israel (…) I call on you to immediately stop the legislative process,” he added, addressing Netanyahu’s cabinet and his parliamentary allies.
The head of the Histadrut, Israel’s big trade union center, added to the pressure and called for an immediate general strike on Monday.
We are on a mission to stop this legislative process, and we will,” Arnon Bar-David said in a televised message.
The College of Physicians quickly announced a “total strike in the health system”, which will impact public hospitals.
The strike was also affecting flights at Ben Gurion International Airport near Tel Aviv, Liza Dvir, a spokeswoman for the airport authority, told AFP.
“Israel is not a dictatorship”
The strike call and Herzog’s call came after the demonstrations on Sunday night in Tel Aviv, after Netanyahu dismissed Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for asking for a month-long pause in the legislative process to approve the reform. .
The project promoted by the Netanyahu government, one of the most right-wing in the history of Israel, seeks to increase the power of politicians over judges and decrease the role of the Supreme Court.
Its detractors consider that the reform threatens the separation of powers and the democratic character of the State of Israel, and the rejection of the project generated in the last three months one of the largest popular protest movements in the country’s history.
In the mobilization on Sunday, the protesters occupied a large avenue that crosses Tel Aviv and set up barricades and bonfires. The police responded by firing water cannons.
Demonstrators waved Israeli flags and chanted slogans such as “Israel is not a dictatorship!” and “No to a fascist government.”
“Last night we witnessed some very difficult scenes,” Herzog pointedly said, making a dramatic appeal to Netanyahu’s government: “All the people of Israel are looking at you. All the Jewish people are looking at you. The whole world is looking at you.”
According to the Israeli press, Netanyahu could address the country this Monday.
United States, restless
Demonstrators also gathered in front of Parliament in Jerusalem on Monday.
“We ask the government to stop this crazy reform,” Keren Mimran, 57, who works in the high-tech sector, told AFP.
“Israel has become a very dangerous place right now,” said Trevor Galor, owner of a tourism business.
Netanyahu and his ultra-Orthodox and far-right allies defend the reform, arguing that the balance of forces between elected officials and the Supreme Court, which they see as politicized, must be balanced.
The legislative process continues, and this Monday, the parliamentary commission of laws voted in favor of one of the key elements of the reform: the bill that modifies the process for appointing judges.
The United States, a great ally of Israel, has expressed its concern and stressed the “urgent need for a compromise.”
“Fundamental changes in a democratic system must be carried out with the broadest possible base of popular support,” said the spokeswoman for the National Security Council of the White HouseAdrienne Watson, in a statement.
In a televised address Thursday night, Netanyahu vowed to “end the division” but reiterated his determination to push reform forward.
The next day, the prime minister was called to order by the court, which considered his public intervention regarding the judicial reform “illegal”, since he is implicated in processes for bribery, fraud and breach of trust, charges that he denies.
In May 2020, the Israeli Supreme Court ruled that an indicted prime minister did not have the right to act in an area where he could be involved in a conflict of interest.
