Protesters descend on Jerusalem as Netanyahu seeks to weaken the courts

JERUSALEM – Tens of thousands of Israelis went on strike Monday, protesting outside the Knesset in what they say is a final push to stop Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from weakening the country’s judicial system.

As protesters waved Israeli flags and shouted “Israel is not a dictatorship” and “shame, shame,” members of Netanyahu’s coalition voted to send the first of two bills to parliament, despite last-ditch calls for dialogue from President Biden and the Israeli president.

By the day’s end, the two sides remained at a stalemate. Opposition leader Yair Lapid rejected overtures from key architects of the legislation, saying in a statement that “the necessary condition to start a national dialogue is an immediate halt of all legislation processes.”

Earlier in the morning, lawmakers engaged in shouting matches over the bills before a contentious vote in the Constitution, Law and Justice Committee.

Thousands of schoolchildren also marched in Tel Aviv, part of smaller-scale protests throughout the country. In Jerusalem, some women wore the red cloaks and white bonnets from the dystopian novel and series “The Handmaid’s Tale” to protest what they feared could be a rollback of women’s rights and secular freedoms without an independent judiciary.

Brit Shwartz, 28, came from the southern city of Beersheba “to protect our democracy.” It was the medical student’s first time attending a protest over the judicial reforms, she said. Shwartz joined a group praying at the Western Wall, a holy site for Jews, before joining a march to parliament, where some protesters waved pride flags and signs reading “religious people believe in democracy” in the biggest demonstration at the Knesset in years.

Biden over the weekend urged Netanyahu to focus on “consensus building” before pushing through any changes – though Netanyahu has repeatedly refused to back down. Instead, Israel’s longest serving prime minister has sought to fast-track the legislation, which would weaken oversight of legislation by Israel’s Supreme Court and give lawmakers the power to appoint judges, among other changes. It remains unclear when the bills will come up for a vote before the full parliament.

In a late-night speech Sunday, Israeli President Isaac Herzog laid out a proposal for negotiations while praising protesters as “patriots.”

“I feel, we all feel, that we are a moment before a clash, even a violent clash,” he said.

Netanyahu, who is battling corruption charges that carry possible prison time, returned to power in late December after four years of political deadlock, heading the most far-right government in Israel’s history – a coalition of religious nationalists and settler activists who have pledged to support his judicial reforms.

Netanyahu says the legislative changes are needed to curb Israel’s activist judges, rein in alleged judicial corruption and increase diversity on the bench. His opponents say he is merely trying to avoid prosecution; and they fear the changes would destroy the country’s system of checks and balances and irreparably weaken the Supreme Court, which many Israelis consider the last bastion of their democracy. The issue has pitted liberal and secular Jewish Israelis against more right-wing and religiously conservative citizens.

Netanyahu has called the corruption charges against him part of a witch hunt by the courts and media, an argument that resonates with his core supporters.

Ahead of Monday’s strike, an estimated 200,000 Israelis demonstrated across the country Saturday, organizers said, one of the biggest turnouts yet in weekly anti-government rallies that have been happening for nearly two months.

Netanyahu’s proposed overhaul has also elicited a growing backlash from Israel’s lucrative tech sector. A handful of start-ups have begun pulling money out of the country, Israeli media reported, amid recent warnings from J.P. Morgan and Goldman Sachs, as well as Britain’s Barclays Bank, about the rising risk of investing in Israel.

“What we see here (with the reforms) is bad for the economy,” said Itai Ater, a professor of economics at Tel Aviv University. “How fast the risk is going up is not yet certain. But it is rising and the people are worried.”

Of particular concern, Ater said, is that the new laws and legal instability will dampen investment in Israel’s tech sector and lead to an industry brain drain. “Corruption increases without a strong and independent judiciary,” Ater said.

Some economists have compared the situation to Poland, whose credit rating was lowered after passing legislation in 2016 restricting judicial independence.

Economy Minister and Likud Party member Nir Barkat rejected claims earlier this month that the judicial overhaul would be bad for the economy.

“There’s no doubt in my mind that it will continue scaling and growing,” he said.

Hundreds of tech companies, among others, announced their support for Monday’s strike and some provided transportation to Jerusalem, according to Israel’s Globes news site. State employees, however, were told they could not take leave for the day, while the Histadrut, the country’s largest and oldest trade union, said it would not participate.

The showdown comes as Israel is also struggling to control growing insecurity and violence in the occupied West Bank, which CIA Director William J. Burns warned earlier this month could escalate into a full-blown Palestinian uprising. More than 45 Palestinians in the West Bank have been killed by Israeli forces or settlers so far this year, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent, the highest rate in years.

Early Monday, Israeli forces shot dead a 21-year-old Palestinian in a raid in Nablus, which Israel said was an arrest operation for assailants wanted in the killing of a soldier. On Friday, a car-ramming attack killed three Israelis, including 6-year-old and 8-year-old brothers, in a Jewish settlement in East Jerusalem. Police fatally shot the driver. Israeli forces and settlers killed two other Palestinians over the weekend, including a minor.

Key religious nationalist members of Netanyahu’s coalition, who support his judicial changes, want to entirely annex the West Bank, where some 3 million Palestinians live along with a half-million Israeli settlers, in violation of international law. Rights groups have long accused Israel of violating the rights of Palestinians in the occupied territories and inside Israel.

A small group of anti-occupation protesters also gathered in front of parliament Monday, waving a flag that said “Democracy for all” in Arabic and a form of gender-inclusive Hebrew.

But Maya Berg, a 27-year-old tech worker from outside Tel Aviv, said she saw the two issues as “separate.”

“This is about democracy in Israel,” she said. “We are here to show there is opposition” to Netanyahu’s plans to “change Israel.”