Israel has mega-protest against judicial reform, and president speaks of country on the verge of collapse

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The Israeli Parliament was the scene of mass protests this Monday (13), when voting began on a project that threatens the autonomy of the judiciary in the country.

On the floor, lawmakers traded insults, calling each other fascists and traitors. Some congressmen were forced to withdraw from the session for causing turmoil, and one parliamentarian even cried, according to a report by the Reuters news agency.

Already around the building in Jerusalem, tens of thousands of citizens gathered to protest against the project, continuing acts that have lasted more than a month. Holding Israeli flags and banners with slogans such as “save Israeli democracy” and “country in moral bankruptcy”, they even bent part of the railing that surrounded the building. Protesters even called for a national strike for the date.

The cause that has been mobilizing the country for weeks is a controversial judicial reform proposed by Binyamin Netanyahu’s far-right government. It would, among other measures, allow the Knesset, the Israeli Parliament, to overturn Supreme Court decisions through a simple majority vote – something that the coalition that elected him, for example, has.

The government argues that reform is necessary to take justice out of the hands of what it calls elitist and biased judges. In practice, however, it would give the prime minister and his allies superpowers for the duration of his term. And, according to opponents, it would undermine the independence of the judiciary and weaken the balance of powers that underpins the rule of law.

Among those who are against the measure is the country’s president, Isaac Herzog. On Sunday, the leader, who occupies a mainly ceremonial post, made a rare address to the nation in which he warned that the reform would take Israel “to the brink of a legal and social collapse”.

In the end, Herzog begged Bibi, as the prime minister is known, to suspend the legislative process and talk to the opposition to reach an agreement. “I ask you not to introduce the bill at first reading,” he said.

The request was in vain – the commission responsible for analyzing the proposal by the Minister of Justice, Yariv Levin, approved some parts of the legislation this Monday.

Another who urged the prime minister to seek consensus before going ahead with the bill was the president of the United States, Joe Biden. Also on Sunday, he argued in an article published in the New York Times that an independent judiciary is one of the foundations of both American and Israeli democracy.

The internal political dispute takes place at a time of growing tension between the country and Palestine, after the murder of seven people in front of a synagogue last month. Earlier, at least ten Palestinians were killed in an Israeli Army action.

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