Nadene Goldfoot
JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel’s Supreme Court struck down a key component of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s contentious judicial overhaul Monday, delivering a landmark decision that could reopen the fissures in Israeli society that preceded the country’s ongoing war against Hamas.
In Monday’s decision, the court narrowly voted to overturn a law passed in July that prevents judges from striking down government decisions they deem “unreasonable.” Opponents had argued that Netanyahu’s efforts to remove the standard of reasonability opens the door to corruption and improper appointments of unqualified cronies to important positions.
The law was the first in a planned overhaul of the Israeli justice system. The overhaul was put on hold after Hamas militants carried out their Oct. 7 attack, killing some 1,200 people and kidnapping 240 others. Israel immediately declared war, and is pressing forward with an offensive that Palestinian health officials say has killed nearly 22,000 people in Gaza.
In an 8-7 decision, the Supreme Court justices struck down the law because of the “severe and unprecedented harm to the core character of the State of Israel as a democratic country.”
(Netanyahu’s coalition, a collection of ultranationalist and ultrareligious lawmakers, unveiled the overhaul earlier this year, saying it was necessary to rein in an unelected judiciary they believe wields too much power.)
Legal experts warn that could spark a constitutional crisis, where citizens and the country’s security forces are left to decide whose orders to follow — the parliament’s or the court’s.
The political survival of Netanyahu, who returned to power late last year while standing trial on bribery, fraud and breach of trust charges, is also bound up with the overhaul. His hard-line, religiously conservative coalition partners have threatened to rebel if he doesn’t see the legislation through, and critics say Netanyahu could use the overhaul to get the charges against him dismissed.
Critics say the plan — which would weaken the Supreme Court — is a profound threat to Israeli democracy and that it would concentrate power in the hands of Netanyahu and his allies.
They say the court is a key counterweight on majority rule in a country with an otherwise weak system of checks and balances — with just one house of parliament where the governing coalition is headed by the prime minister. The country’s president has largely ceremonial powers, and there is no firm, written constitution.
The planned overhaul sparked months of mass protests, threatened to trigger a constitutional crisis between the judicial and legislative branches of government, and rattled the cohesion of Israel’s powerful military.
Those divisions were largely put aside after Hamas militants carried out a bloody cross-border attack in southern Israel on Oct. 7, triggering a war that has raged in Gaza for nearly three months. But Monday’s court decision could reignite those tensions even while the country remains at war.
Justice Minister Yariv Levin, born 22 June 1969 in Jerusalem, a Netanyahu ally and the architect of the overhaul, lambasted the court’s decision, saying it demonstrated “the opposite of the spirit of unity required these days for the success of our soldiers on the front.”
Levin, 54, was born in Jerusalem to Gail and Aryeh Levin, an Israel Prize laureate for linguistics. His mother's uncle, Eliyahu Lankin, was commander of the Altalena ship and member of the first Knesset, representing Herut, whilst Menachem Begin was the Sandek at Levin's circumcision ceremony. Yariv Gideon Levin (Hebrew: יָרִיב גִּדְעוֹן לֵוִין, born 22 June 1969) is an Israeli lawyer and politician who serves as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Justice. He served as Speaker of the Knesset in December 2022, previously serving that role from 2020 to 2021. He currently serves as a member of Knesset for Likud, and previously held the posts of Minister of Internal Security, Minister of Tourism, and Minister of Aliyah and Integration.
Resource:
https://apnews.com/article/israel-supreme-court-judicial-overhaul-78733a94428b8b9f2c311ee6779eba23
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/ap-ml-israel-politics_n_6592f5d0e4b0b01d3e403eaa
No comments:
Post a Comment