Israeli parliament in uproar over Netanyahu plans for judiciary

[February 13, 2023]  By Maayan Lubell

JERUSALEM (Reuters) -Israeli lawmakers traded insults on Monday over government plans to overhaul the judiciary while tens of thousands of protesters gathered outside parliament, as President Isaac Herzog warned the country risked tipping into "constitutional collapse".

The plans, which would give right-wing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu greater control of appointments to the bench and weaken the Supreme Court's ability to strike down legislation or rule against the executive, have triggered angry protests across Israel for weeks.

On Monday, the Knesset Constitution Committee voted to send the first chapter of the plan to the plenum for a first reading, after a rowdy start to the meeting in which several lawmakers were thrown out forcibly, to shouts of "shame, shame".

"You will burn up the country!," Idan Roll of the centrist Yesh Atid party told Simcha Rothman, the panel chairman from the hard-right Religious Zionism bloc before being ushered out.

As lawmakers traded calls of "fascist" and "traitor" and one was reduced to tears inside the Knesset, large crowds began to build up outside as protesters streamed in to join the demonstration.

Netanyahu, currently on trial on corruption charges which he denies, says the changes are needed to restore balance in the system and curb activist judges who have overreached their powers to interfere in the political sphere.

But the plans have exposed deep splits within Israeli society, pitting the economic establishment and more liberal sections of the country against supporters of Netanyahu and his right-wing religious and nationalist coalition allies.

Critics say the plans risk destroying democratic checks and balances and isolating Israel internationally by weakening the courts, handing unbridled power to the executive and endangering human rights and civil liberties.

Tens of thousands have demonstrated against the plans in weekly protests in Tel Aviv and other Israeli cities and morning trains from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem on Monday were packed with people, many carrying Israeli flags and protest signs, heading to the demonstration.

A woman stands in front of a large picture of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a demonstration against proposed judicial reforms by Israel's new right-wing government in Tel Aviv, Israel January 28, 2023. REUTERS/Corinna Kern

On Sunday evening, in a rare intervention, head of state Herzog made a televised plea for consensus, saying that the bitterness had left Israel on the brink of "constitutional and social collapse".

HEIGHTENED ANXIETY

The standoff comes at a time of heightened anxiety over security in Israel after two deadly attacks by Palestinians in recent weeks that killed 10 people and piled pressure on Netanyahu's hardline government allies to react.

Netanyahu's Likud party and its allies have denounced opponents of the proposals as embittered leftists who refuse to accept the results of last year's election that brought one of the most right-wing governments in Israel's history to power.

But as well as the parliamentary opposition, warnings have come from Israel's banks and tech sector that the changes risked undermining the civil institutions that underpin Israel's economic prosperity.

U.S. President Joe Biden has urged Netanyahu to build consensus before pushing through far-reaching changes, saying in comments published by the New York Times on Sunday that an independent judiciary was one of the foundations of U.S. and Israeli democracy.

Rothman, one of the driving forces behind the proposals, said he welcomed Herzog's calls for all sides to come together.

"I urge, again, everyone who wants to negotiate with good faith to come to the president and do it," he told Reuters.

(Additional reporting by Hannah Confino; Writing by James Mackenzie, editing by Ed Osmond)

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