Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dismissed concerns over reforms to the country’s judiciary system, saying claims that they are “the end of Israeli democracy” are “silly.”
In an ABC interview Thursday, Netanyahu said the reforms — which have caused mass protests in Israel — are necessary to reel in a judicial system that has gone too far.
The balance of power “has been taken off the rails in the last 20 years because we have the most activist judicial court on the planet,” Netanyahu said.
The reforms limit the power of the judiciary to overrule actions by the country’s legislature and change how judges are appointed. Critics have claimed that the reforms take away guardrails preventing the consolidation of power in the Israeli government.
“This is something that concerns millions of Israelis who, for the last 20 years, feel that they’re going to the polls, they’re voting in a government, voting for policies that are then nullified by a judiciary that aggregated itself the powers of the majority,” Netanyahu said. “That I don’t think is right for democracy.”
Israeli law is derived from the nation’s Declaration of Independence, which is interpreted by its judiciary.
Since the moves were announced earlier this year, hundreds of thousands of Israelis have protested in the streets against them. Military leaders have also criticized the reforms, saying their unpopularity could discourage Israeli citizens from serving in the military. Some military reserve members have said they will not serve if called upon because of the changes.
Those protests garnered the support of a significant number of House Democrats.
President Biden also shared caution over the reforms, urging Netanyahu to hold off for now and take the process slowly. Netanyahu did pause the reform process for a few months, heeding the concerns, but is going through with the reforms now.
The reforms are deeply unpopular in the Israeli public. A poll by Israeli media this week found that over a quarter of Israelis have considered leaving the country amid the changes. Over half shared concerns about the country falling into civil war.
Netanyahu described the change as “minor,” but acknowledged that attempts to negotiate with the opposition party in the legislature have failed.
“I pressed the pause button for three months, tried to get some compromise on anything and couldn’t get anything from the opposition,” he said. “I’ll try to proceed, if not with a consensus with the opposition … then at least on something that has as broad acceptance in the public.”
“I’m more optimistic now than I was before,” Netanyahu said on compromise with the opposition. “Now that they can see that we’re prepared to move without them, we have the majority, maybe we’ll be able to move with them.”
The first bill of the reforms was passed Monday. That bill, the “reasonableness law,” limits what government decisions the judiciary can review and is considered the first step in Netanyahu’s party’s total reforms.
Opposition lawmakers boycotted the vote. The activist group Movement for Quality Government has announced it will challenge the legislation.
The law “fundamentally changes the basic structure of Israeli parliamentary democracy and the nature of the regime, while de facto abolishing the judiciary and seriously damaging the delicate fabric of the separation of powers and the system of checks and balances in the State of Israel,” the group said this week.
The White House called the vote’s circumstances “unfortunate.”
Its passage sparked another wave of protests across the country.