End of Juristocracy will Bolster Israeli Democracy
by israelnationalnews.com team
Josh Hammer, who is Newsweek’s opinion editor and host of ‘The Josh Hammer Show’, relates in his latest op-ed to the planned Judicial reform led by Justice Minister MK Yariv Levin and the reactions to it in Israel and abroad.
“There is no substantive basis whatsoever for these performative shrieks of hysteria. The Netanyahu-led government’s judicial reform package is just and proper, as a matter of both political theory and comparative constitutional law.”
Hammer claims that “the judicial reform package would substantially bolster Israel’s actual democracy by diminishing its juristocracy.”
“Things began to go haywire for Israel in the 1990s”, Hammer explains, “During that time, Aharon Barak, chief justice of Israel’s Supreme Court, pronounced a “constitutional revolution” and arrogated to his institution power unprecedented for any supreme court in any Western-style democracy. As a result of Barak’s “revolution,” the Court usurped a plenary power to overturn any piece of legislation at any time, for any reason whatsoever.”
The current situation in Israel is a “Judicial supremacy” and Hammer says that if the US Supreme Court acted the way the Israeli Supreme Court acts “cities would probably burn.”
The Wall Street Journal Editorial Board showed its support for the new Israeli government’s judicial reforms. “Every time a right-wing government wins an election these days, the immediate refrain from the dominant global media is that it’s a threat to democracy.”
The Israeli Supreme Court holds more power than its American counterpart while not being bound by a constitution, knocking down bills it sees merely as “unreasonable.”
Supreme Court Co-ordinates Protests?
Supreme Court President Esther Hayut met twice at her home with former Minister of Justice Tzipi Livni, who is one of the leaders of the protests against the government’s judicial reform. (So much for neutrality of the judicial system!)
Food for Thought. by Steven Shamrak
Unfortunately, too many Jews are ready to fight anti-Semitism only, but when it comes to discuss and plan the future of the Jewish people and re-unification of Eretz-Israel they do not have much interest to get involved. Other important Jewish issues, like assimilation due to lack of national identity and intermarriage, are ignored completely. At the same time, many Jews – due to a ‘Ghetto Mentality’ – appeasement of the enemies, and/or pathological self-hate, are quite vocal and even aggressive anti-Zionists and anti-Israel!
Saudis Set Condition for ‘Friendship’ with Israel
Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister, Prince Faisal bin Farhan, said that an agreement to create a Palestinian state would be a precondition for his country to establish formal diplomatic ties with Israel. Neighbours of the kingdom, including the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, formalized relationships with Israel in 2020 under the US-brokered Abraham Accords. (With a friend like that, who needs an enemies.)
Biden Admin – Jewish Prayer in Jerusalem “Unacceptable”
The Biden administration says an Israeli proposal to end the ban on Jewish prayer at the Temple Mount in Jerusalem would be an “unacceptable” disruption to the “historic status quo.” Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who sits on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the Biden administration has a “pathological obsession with undermining Israel and is endangering the national security of America and our allies. It should not be controversial for a Jew to visit the holiest site in Judaism.” (There are still many ‘unacceptable’ and ugly status quos in the US. The sharp rise of anti-Semitism is one of them. Fix them first!)
Arab Public Broadcasting – Enemy Within
Two presenters waved a PLO flag on a program on Makan, Israel’s public broadcasting network in Arabic, while discussing the order to the police by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir to enforce the ban on flying the PLO flag while sarcastically waving a PLO flag.
Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak has called for Israelis to become involved in street battles to oust Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “This is an elected government. It is legitimate, but its actions and plans revolve around a coup. This makes it illegitimate. Therefore, it is the duty of every citizen to join the fight for the sake of the country. This is an imminent danger for the collapse of Israel’s democracy. It has been said before: democracy must know how to defend itself from within against those who use its rules and freedoms to destroy it,” he said. (Israeli voters elected the new government. Barak used the word “Democracy”, which the anti-Zionist political Left does not like, contradicting the true meaning of it, and ignoring the will of the voters.)
Quote of the Week:
“Itamar Ben-Gvir’s appointment has had a huge deterrent effect, primarily in the Arab sector. There’s a certain sense of caution, of tense wariness, since he arrived in government. The police are implementing the new government’s regulations. We’re all partners in this and we’re all in a determined battle against violence and crime in the Arab sector. When Ben-Gvir visited the senior command staff at national police headquarters, he brought with him a tremendous amount of energy and desire to give, and stressed his intention to invest, to provide enhanced resources, and to increase the salaries of police officers.” – Eli Levy, Police Spokesman Commissioner – the anti-Zionist Left tries to portray a completely different picture – confrontation between the police and the new minister.
Hypocrisy of the Supreme Court Protest
by Rabbi Prof. Dov Fischer
Eighty thousand Leftist-Secular demonstrators in Tel Aviv, many waving PLO flags. How about more than two million, three hundred and sixty thousand – 2,360,000 – Right-Wing (Zionist), Religious demonstrators throughout Israel on Election Day? Remember these numbers?
· Likud: 1,115,336
· Religious Zionism: 516,470
· Shas: 392,964
· United Torah Judaism: 280,194
· Habayit Hayehudi: 56,775
If you include other right-wing and religious wasted votes for even smaller parties, you are at more than two and a half million.
The Left’s attacks on proposed reforms to Israel’s warped and sometimes outright corrupt Supreme Court institution border on the demagogic.
Israel is not the United States, and hopefully never will be. America is not an ideal model for freedom and democracy. Israel’s elections are indescribably more honest and democratic than America’s. Besides, with five national elections in three and a half years. Most European democracies differ from America’s model for governance and jurisprudence.
Like the UK, Israel has a robust Western democratic structure while maintaining an historic bond with the religious identity that underlies its existence. There is a Chief Rabbinate, a ministry of religion, and other institutions that define a Jewish country. During all the years that the Israeli Left – including pro-Stalin Mapam Communists, hard-line Marxist socialists, and other anti-religious extremists – ruled the nest, no serious question arose as to Israel’s core commitment to democracy, side by side with its unique Judaic cultural and religious heritage and institutions. The socialist secularist Ben-Gurion laid that groundwork.
In Barak’s leftist regime, whatever would seem “reasonable” to his small coterie of justices became law autocratically without voter participation in the process, superseding the popularly elected Knesset.
It was legal to tear down and expel 8,600 Jews from Gush Katif and to tear down Netiv HaAvot in Gush Etzion but not to remove Bedouin from Jewish land on which they illegally built in the Negev. Moreover, six thousand were arrested without cause for demonstrating peacefully against the Gush Katif catastrophe, and the Supreme Court did not protect the rights of those incarcerated innocents.
The hysterical protests against those reforms are demagogic and anti-democratic. The votes of 2,360,000 outweigh the chants of 80,000 sore losers. Israel’s Jewish voters democratically have opted repeatedly for a distinctly religious-nationalist course away from the secular-left direction that preceded it.
Read previous Editorials here.