Like a volcano erupting after a period of dormancy, the protests in Israel have regained strength. The fuse has been the far-right government of Benjamin Netanyahu itself, which has pushed back the key bill in the reform package to limit the power of the Supreme Court.
“It’s the second assault”, declared Yair yesterday while carrying his son on his back, during a night march towards the Knesset (Parliament). “The extreme right of Israel, led by settlers, has changed its strategy and is trying to introduce the reform little by little”, he added.
The spark of the outbreak in the streets, dubbed Tuesday of resistance, has been the initial approval of a law that would prevent judges from being able to annul decisions made by the government, ministers and elected officials to consider- the unreasonable ones.
For supporters, this modification – which will have to be completed with two more votes in the Knesset – would allow a more effective executive, without attacking other criteria of judicial control, such as proportionality. For detractors, the legislation would damage the balance of power and open the door to corruption and abuse of power.
The last group includes the tens of thousands of people who mobilized all day yesterday in Tel-Aviv, Jerusalem, Haifa, Beer Sheva and other Israeli cities, with multiple actions: from blocking highways and accesses to strikes of universities and bank workers and high-tech firms, passing through a mass protest of between 10,000 and 15,000 Israelis at Ben-Gurion International Airport.
“They believed that people would not return to the streets”, analyzed a protester of Chilean origin who emigrated to Israel 34 years ago, “but I find it hard to believe that we will stop protesting until the government understands that it must reach a consensus “.
Andy, an Argentine who also settled in Israel three decades ago, added that “every day this government crosses another red line”. Using a parallel with the homeland, he used the term “cleft” to define the polarization of Israeli society between “liberals and conservatives”, and explains that “the way this government legislates further deepens these cracks” .
Parallel to the social eruption, the police response has also intensified, with dozens of arrests and images of officers pushing, grabbing or hitting demonstrators.
The “rift” in Israel is far from closed. On the contrary, Netanyahu’s coalition has warned that it will not amend the reasonableness bill and aims to complete its approval before the next parliamentary shutdown at the end of July.
