Wetherhorn

Jerusalem was flooded with people from all over the country, One reporter said there were as many as 250,000.

They came to express concern. The current Israeli government has embarked on a program of “Judicial Reform”. The initiator is the Minister of Justice, and his program includes several paragraphs in the draft bill that are really seriously problematic.

He wants to have the selection process for justices, including those of the Israeli Supreme Court, put in the hands of a newly constituted committee. The old committee, he claims, is too much in the hands of the sitting judiciary. The new one will have an automatic majority of members chosen mostly from the current government’s largest party. To be fair, there is a case to be made for making some changes there. He called the current system, which has been around for a long time, a tyranny. He wants to replace it with a new tyranny. One that his political party controls absolutely.

Another part of the proposed reform bill gives the lawmaking body of representatives, the Israeli Knesset, the power to override ANY supreme court ruling. This can be done with a simple majority of one single individual vote. This, to many of those who came to voice their concern, means an end to anything resembling a system of checks and balances between the branches of government in the country.

Another paragraph of the proposed bill voids the consideration by the court in taking into account conditions, and even convictions, that did not result in actual imprisonment. The court has recently ruled that the head of one of the ruling coalition partner parties was not eligible to hold ministerial positions. He had previously been convicted, twice, of fraud, tax evasion, and breach of trust. He was given a suspended sentence, partly because he also promised to abstain from future political activity. Of course, that promise was honored for only one governmental term. Currently, he is “officially” not holding either of two ministries Prime Minister Netanyahu gave him. But the two replacement individuals from his own party followers have so far (~ 2 months) not even set foot in the offices they are supposed to be running. This situation has resulted in the Israeli Movement for Quality Government (an NGO) to file a complaint with the courts accusing the civil servant heads of those ministries of contempt of court since they are, obviously, still taking their instructions from the man who has been banned from office.He also continues to attend cabinet meetings under the protection of a law that allows the prime minister to invite outsiders whose expert opinion may be helpful during cabinet discussions.

Prime Minister Netanyahu is, himself, currently on trial for similar offenses. Because of possible conflict of interest issues the PM is not supposed to be involved himself. But he has no lack of other party hacks who can take up the struggle. If the bill passes, it will probably destroy any chance of the prosecutors for gaining a conviction. And even if he is convicted, the ruling coalition would be able to overturn the verdict with a simple new law, requiring only a one vote majority.

I must also mention that the proposed legislation will also break up the office of the Israeli equivalent of the Attorney General. It also makes opinions by that, and other governmental, legal advisors essentially weightless.

A final part of the new legislation includes removing correspondence and conversations of ALL governmental ministers, and ALL individuals working in their offices, exempt from police criminal investigation.

My wife says she never thought that when we moved here 50 years ago we would ever be living under a third world despotic regime. A few Israeli hi-tech firms have already transferred most of their operations and funding to other locations, outside Israel, because of trepidation regarding the effects of this, and other similar, legislation will have on the investment climate.

The one ray of hope that still remains is that the coalition will modify the draft bill that has already been submitted. The chairman of the Knesset committee that submitted the bill has indicated that he is open to discussing such changes to the bill, and even actually modifying it, before it comes up for final ratification.

A week ago, before the massive demonstrations, he was still adamant that the bill should go through immediately as written.

Once again, to be even-handed, there are some places where the Israeli Judiciary could probably stand changing. This is especially true with regard to increasing the number of judges in lower courts where the backlog of cases is resulting in long delays.