Israeli Government Renews Drive To Limit Judiciary
On Tuesday, the Israeli parliament advanced a new law from the government’s controversial judicial reform package.
The Constitution, Law, and Justice Committee of the Israeli parliament, or Knesset, voted to move the bill forward despite impassioned opposition from political opponents.
The proposed law would remove the Israeli Supreme Court’s ability to review the “reasonableness” of decisions and appointments made by the government and individual cabinet ministers.
According to the Knesset’s rules, coalition members can now bring the law to the entire parliament for the first of three votes.
The current government led by Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is the most right-wing in the country’s history and rests on the parliamentary support of several extreme nationalist and religious parties.
The coalition began its term in early 2023 with a push to restructure and restrict the Supreme Court’s authority and independence. However, that effort has provoked intense pushback, with hundreds of thousands demonstrating for months against the disputed reforms.
Critics have called the reforms a coup. The coalition says it is merely seeking to give the new government the powers it needs to enact the policies its voters want.
In March, the coalition agreed to halt plans to restructure the judiciary and to hold talks with the political opposition. However, those talks have broken down, and the government has signaled its intent to resume course.
