FROM THE RELEVANT JERUSALEM – The escalators roll out smiling faces, blue and white flags and the amazement at finding oneself in so many queues to board trains that not even rush hour commuters have ever experienced full. Standing room only for those who want to be there, the deputies also stand up and discuss the first steps of the “reform” advocated by the government at the same time, the opposition deputies get on their desks, yell, are taken down from the table ushers, they still vote away. The coalition in power continues without them and without the sharing demanded by President Isaac Herzog in a televised address to the nation and even by American leader Joe Biden.
General strike of the private sector – unusual for this country – vacates offices and moves Israel, companies provide buses to go to Jerusalem, the others by car or train, a procession rising towards the city and Knesset, appointment for noon, pressed against the barriers erected by the police. The loudspeakers amplify the words of Benjamin Netanyahu, who reiterated ten years ago: “Without a strong and independent Supreme Court, there is no protection of rights. That’s the difference between democracy and dictatorship.”
Now – protesters have been shouting for over a month, nearly 250,000 last Saturday – it is the Prime Minister who is jeopardizing the balance of power with a project he plans to put before judges, prosecutors and the High Court – accused of hyperactivism and that he has exceeded his mandate – control of politics, parliament and most importantly the majority he is expressing at this moment. From the far-right majority at the moment. Yossi Beilin, the negotiator of the 1994 peace deal with the Palestinians, warns that the plan “would make us Hungary”. That’s what managers fear, the serial innovators of start-ups, the four CEOs of the largest banks who have signed an appeal to Netanyahu: less legal certainty, fewer investments.
Parents take truant children to Jerusalem, teachers and school principals worry about interference in studies by extremist fringe groups in the coalition. At the Western Wall, Judaism’s holiest site, the ultra-Orthodox – those who do not support the ruling parties – pray for the “protection of democracy”. Not far from the stones of the old city, the corruption trial against Netanyahu continues. Opponents accuse him of orchestrating the “reform” to get out of judicial troubles, with the right viewing the process as a judicial coup to remove from power the prime minister who has served the longest – over fifteen years – in history of the village.