Protesters Hold ‘Day of Paralysis’ in Tel Aviv, Cities Throughout Israel Over Judicial Reform

Protests continued in Israel on Thursday, with a planned day-long campaign billed as a “day of paralysis,” meant to bring the country to a halt in protest of the current judicial reform legislation making its way through the Knesset. Some 500,000 people are expected to join the protests that will be held from early in the morning to late at night throughout the country.

Also on Thursday and related to the judicial reform, after pulling an all-nighter Israel’s Knesset passed the Incapacitation Law, legislation that hampers the Supreme Court’s ability to require the prime minister to take a leave of absence. The bill passed its second and third readings by a vote of 61-47, the minimum number required for passage, in a plenum session that ended at 6 a.m. on Thursday. The law states that a sitting prime minister can only be declared unfit and be forced to step down if three-quarters of government ministers say that he or she must for physical or psychological reasons.

The bill passed in Knesset early Thursday morning is an amendment to Basic Law: The Government, was fast-tracked for passage, and is seen by the opposition as being created to prevent Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu from being ordered by the Supreme Court to take a leave of absence as the Knesset works to pass judicial reform legislation while Netanyahu is on trial for corruption.

The first protests of Thursday included school children and their parents or guardians protesting at intersections; protesters also gathered outside the homes of coalition lawmakers. Protesters blocked the helicopter pad near the private home of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in Caesarea on Thursday morning; Netanyahu is scheduled to leave for London later in the day. The protesters are expected to block traffic on major highways around Ben-Gurion Airport ahead of Netanyahu’s trip. Meanwhile, protesters blocking the maritime port in Ashdod in southern Israel were removed by police on Thursday morning. Police used powerful water cannons against protesters blocking the Ayalon Highway in Tel Aviv, a major thoroughfare, on Thursday afternoon.