Thousands of Israelis went on strike and protested outside parliament Monday in what they say is a final push to stop Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from overhauling the country’s judicial system.
President Biden over the weekend urged Netanyahu to first focus on “” over 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.
Opposition leader Yair Lapid has called on employers to let “every worker who wants to go up to Jerusalem and fight for the country, fight for our democracy.” Netanyahu says the legislative changes are needed to curb Israel’s overly activist judges, rein in alleged judicial corruption and increase diversity. His opponents say they amount to a governmental takeover of the judiciary and Supreme Court, which many Jewish Israelis consider the last bastion of the country’s democracy.
Netanyahu’s proposed overhaul has also elicited a growing backlash from Israel’s lucrative tech sector. A handful of well-known start-ups have begun pulling money out of the country, Israeli media has reported, amid warnings from U.S. and international banks and investors that the reforms would raise the 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.
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