Israel General Discussion: Annus Horribilis

[Hnv1]

So the "reasonableness" bill just made it into law. What now?

We go out on the streets. Here be dragons.

good luck to everyone heading out.

[GALeftist]

Sad day for Israel, Palestine, and the whole Middle East. Good luck to those going to protest, and please stay safe. I hope against hope that the United States will finally step up and become a force for good in the region, or at the very least begin to reevaluate our enabling of this downward spiral.

[DavidB.]

Good news, this makes Israel a more robust democracy. Democracy isn't a mob of panicking elites in the streets in Tel Aviv, and it is also not an unelected court striking down laws based on a vague criterion - no, democracy means the highest elected body gets to call the shots in the country. Really don't understand all the fuss about a proposal that makes Israel more democratic, not less.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Good news, this makes Israel a more robust democracy. Democracy isn't a mob of panicking elites in the streets in Tel Aviv, and it is also not an unelected court striking down laws based on a vague criterion - no, democracy means the highest elected body gets to call the shots in the country. Really don't understand all the fuss about a proposal that makes Israel more democratic, not less.

It makes Israel more democratic but less liberal-democratic. I'll allow that a lot of the rhetoric around it doesn't really make the distinction.

[Comrade Funk]

Good news, this makes Israel a more robust democracy. Democracy isn't a mob of panicking elites in the streets in Tel Aviv, and it is also not an unelected court striking down laws based on a vague criterion - no, democracy means the highest elected body gets to call the shots in the country. Really don't understand all the fuss about a proposal that makes Israel more democratic, not less.

More democratic so they can instill hardcore religious policy and entrench the settlers in the apartheid West Bank.

[President Johnson]

Many apologies if that was already discussed elsewhere, but since Herzog came out against these proposals, can't he just refuse to sign the bill? Wikipedia article about the presidency doesn't answer the question. In some other countries with ceremonial heads of state, their approval is still necessary (in Germany no bill can go into effect without the president's signature, though he usually only refuses to sign when constitutionality is in question).

[OSR stands with Israel]

Israel should just have a system where it has the President appoint justices to the Supreme Court and given the President is not part of parliament, it still preserves checks and balances.

The judicial branch also needs checks and one way to put a check on it is by having one of the other branches appoint justices and the other confirm appointments.

[DavidB.]

Good news, this makes Israel a more robust democracy. Democracy isn't a mob of panicking elites in the streets in Tel Aviv, and it is also not an unelected court striking down laws based on a vague criterion - no, democracy means the highest elected body gets to call the shots in the country. Really don't understand all the fuss about a proposal that makes Israel more democratic, not less.

More democratic so they can instill hardcore religious policy and entrench the settlers in the apartheid West Bank.

If this is what people vote for, it should happen. That's democracy. This includes policy outcomes you may not like.

It makes Israel more democratic but less liberal-democratic. I'll allow that a lot of the rhetoric around it doesn't really make the distinction.

Yes, agreed.

[Alcibiades]

Good news, this makes Israel a more robust democracy. Democracy isn't a mob of panicking elites in the streets in Tel Aviv, and it is also not an unelected court striking down laws based on a vague criterion - no, democracy means the highest elected body gets to call the shots in the country. Really don't understand all the fuss about a proposal that makes Israel more democratic, not less.

More democratic so they can instill hardcore religious policy and entrench the settlers in the apartheid West Bank.

If this is what people vote for, it should happen. That's democracy. This includes policy outcomes you may not like.

Democracy isn’t the ultimate and only value. It can conflict with other important values — for instance, those broadly liberal ones such as freedom and equality — which in some cases should trump it. On another note, “panicking elites” is a ridiculous characterisation of the opposition to the judicial reform, which has mobilised a diverse swathe of Israeli civil society.

[Hnv1]

Good news, this makes Israel a more robust democracy. Democracy isn't a mob of panicking elites in the streets in Tel Aviv, and it is also not an unelected court striking down laws based on a vague criterion - no, democracy means the highest elected body gets to call the shots in the country. Really don't understand all the fuss about a proposal that makes Israel more democratic, not less.

We don’t a robust democracy, we want a robust liberal democracy. In a liberal democracy a parliamentary majority is constrained by institutional constraints like rights enforced by courts. These rights are not subject to the whims of a majority, any majority. And the Israeli majority has a pretty terrible track record of hurting people. Badly. So it’s quite reasonable people aren’t quite thrilled about a majority of backwards backwater ignorant basket of deplorable getting more power. If that makes us less of a democracy and more of a liberal bureaucracy then fine by me.

[DavidB.]

Democracy isn’t the ultimate and only value. It can conflict with other important values — for instance, those broadly liberal ones such as freedom and equality — which in some cases should trump it.

See, I would have respected the protesters more if they were this open about their views. Perhaps it could have sparked an interesting and mature debate. But "this is the end of Israeli democracy" and all that stuff is the exact opposite of your statement - and a flat-out lie.

On another note, “panicking elites” is a ridiculous characterisation of the opposition to the judicial reform, which has mobilised a diverse swathe of Israeli civil society.

After all the gigantic mischaracterizations of this law and its proponents (on this very page there is a post making fun of the Prime Minister having a heart condition) and the groupthink that this is the end of Israel, I feel I could exaggerate slightly as well. But okay, maybe 20% of the protesters are not part of the elite.

[America Needs R'hllor]

Good news, this makes Israel a more robust democracy. Democracy isn't a mob of panicking elites in the streets in Tel Aviv, and it is also not an unelected court striking down laws based on a vague criterion - no, democracy means the highest elected body gets to call the shots in the country. Really don't understand all the fuss about a proposal that makes Israel more democratic, not less.

This isn't about the reasonability clause, because Ben Gvir and the other fascists are already saying they're moving on to the rest of the judicial overhaul (judicial picking, override cause etc). And anyhow Israel as a country with little to no authority to local government and nearly unlimited power to 60+1 Knesset members needs the reasonability clause to offer a semblance of balance. But this is about something bigger than this, and your mocking of "panicking elites" about hundreds of thousands of Israelis from all backgrounds (which you learned from the speeches and tweets of members of this government) touches on exactly the point.

The liberal public in Israel has had to swallow A LOT: a bunch of Rabbies holding monopoly over important and personal aspects of our life (and death); funding and sacrificing our life for the settlement project, which is a purely religious fanatical project that has nothing to do with our security or zionism; a big and very growing public refusing to share in the burden of holding up a first world economy and the burden of sacrificing our life and best years to protect this country; and a bunch of mockery and derision from the leaders of our country. Now, we drew a red line - this judicial overhaul, which we view as the end of liberal democracy. Members of this government have been adopting very authoritarian rhetoric and actions, and you can't slap away our fears as panic. We drew a line and we say that we refuse to sacrifice for a non-democracy. We've signed on for a liberal democracy, not a corrupt sh**thole like Hungary, Poland and Turkey. This resulted in an unprededented protest movement on a global scale - business leaders calling for strikes, 10,000 reservists saying they will stop serving, huge and consistent protests for months, roads blocked and pressure applied so that even international leaders and national figures such as the Histadrut chairman and the President will call for the legislation to stop.

If this goes through, don't be surprised if our threats will come to pass. Make no mistake- if we, the liberal public, stop serving, Israel's army CAN'T properly function in this region. If we leave, Israel's economy CAN'T remain a first world hightech nation. It simply can't. And it's not because we're your imaginary elite - we're mizrahi, ashkenazi and russian Jews from many backgrounds who achieved education and got what we have with our own two hands, and we're the ones powering this economy while a big chunk of this government's constituencies refuse to participate and allow us to fund their lifestyle.

For you, it means you won't have any safe refuge for if the Europeans suddenly decide they hate Jews again. Just another failing third world country like Lebanon. Hope you're happy.

[President Johnson]

Israel should just have a system where it has the President appoint justices to the Supreme Court and given the President is not part of parliament, it still preserves checks and balances.

The judicial branch also needs checks and one way to put a check on it is by having one of the other branches appoint justices and the other confirm appointments.

Well, the president just appointing judges would entrust a single individual with more power than a legislative body as a whole. Today I'd certainly have a lot more faith in Herzog than Bibi's far-right cabinet and their enablers in parliament, though that may change with new elections.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Israel should just have a system where it has the President appoint justices to the Supreme Court and given the President is not part of parliament, it still preserves checks and balances.

The judicial branch also needs checks and one way to put a check on it is by having one of the other branches appoint justices and the other confirm appointments.

Well, the president just appointing judges would entrust a single individual with more power than a legislative body as a whole. Today I'd certainly have a lot more faith in Herzog than Bibi's far-right cabinet and their enablers in parliament, though that may change with new elections.

Well you could have the Knesset be required to approve all appointments

[Хahar 🤔]

Why is it that the Israeli legislature is legally sovereign? I know very little about the creation of the governmental structures of Israel, but it seems that it was an odd decision to allow a simple legislative majority to make all laws.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Why is it that the Israeli legislature is legally sovereign? I know very little about the creation of the governmental structures of Israel, but it seems that it was an odd decision to allow a simple legislative majority to make all laws.

It's a heavily modified Westminster system. Including the uncodified constitution!

Israel should just have a system where it has the President appoint justices to the Supreme Court and given the President is not part of parliament, it still preserves checks and balances.

The judicial branch also needs checks and one way to put a check on it is by having one of the other branches appoint justices and the other confirm appointments.

Well, the president just appointing judges would entrust a single individual with more power than a legislative body as a whole. Today I'd certainly have a lot more faith in Herzog than Bibi's far-right cabinet and their enablers in parliament, though that may change with new elections.

Well you could have the Knesset be required to approve all appointments

Are you aware that almost literally no other country on the planet envies the American judicial appointments system?

[GALeftist]

The steelman of the "end of Israeli democracy" messaging is that, if a country democratically abandons liberal democracy, a democratic abandon of democracy itself may not be far behind. I am very sympathetic to this case, although I would argue that the fact that literally hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in Area C alone are subject to Israeli civil and military authority without any voice in its government, let alone in their being subject to said authority, by itself calls Israeli democracy into question.

The reality, of course, is that it is messaging targeted at center-right Israelis and at Americans. But even then, messaging is just how politics works. You need to be able to explain to a population that might not intuitively understand the distinction between democracy and liberal democracy why they ought to oppose this reform.

[Хahar 🤔]

Why is it that the Israeli legislature is legally sovereign? I know very little about the creation of the governmental structures of Israel, but it seems that it was an odd decision to allow a simple legislative majority to make all laws.

It's a heavily modified Westminster system. Including the uncodified constitution!

Yes, but that seems like an odd feature to retain amidst the heavy modifications: Australia ditched that aspect decades earlier, notably. I'm curious as to whether there was any discussion of this at the time.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

The steelman of the "end of Israeli democracy" messaging is that, if a country democratically abandons liberal democracy, a democratic abandon of democracy itself may not be far behind. I am very sympathetic to this case, although I would argue that the fact that literally hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in Area C alone are subject to Israeli civil and military authority without any voice in its government, let alone in their being subject to said authority, by itself calls Israeli democracy into question.

The reality, of course, is that it is messaging targeted at center-right Israelis and at Americans. But even then, messaging is just how politics works. You need to be able to explain to a population that might not intuitively understand the distinction between democracy and liberal democracy why they ought to oppose this reform.

Yeah, I agree with all of this. I think risks to liberal democracy are, you know, very very very bad, not just risks to "democracy" in the (as Cathcon once put it) "you vote for who you like and if they win they get in" sense. I don't think DavidB's semantic point actually works as an argument against this and I wasn't trying to suggest that it does by conceding it; quite the contrary.

[Stand With Israel. Crush Hamas]

The real tipping point here is the next election. Netanyahu will almost definitely lose at this point. The question is if he intends to turn this new, more powerful government apparatus over to a center-left coalition that will eviscerate his legacy, or if he'll attempt to use his new, more powerful government apparatus to seize power. If it's the former, Israel will remain a stable democracy but one more susceptible to risky legislative shifts with each election.

[Upper Canada Tory]

Why is it that the Israeli legislature is legally sovereign? I know very little about the creation of the governmental structures of Israel, but it seems that it was an odd decision to allow a simple legislative majority to make all laws.

It's a heavily modified Westminster system. Including the uncodified constitution!

Emphasis on heavily modified. Israel has a very unusual Westminster-inspired system.

Though I think the parliamentary supremacy stems from the fact that Israel doesn't have a codified constitution. In that situation parliamentary supremacy is normally the assumed system, I would imagine.

[America Needs R'hllor]

By the way, a little explainer on the reasonability clause. This isn't meant to allow the judges to tell the government it's unreasonable to bomb Gazan children for questionable security gains - it's meant purely for government decisions on the more bureaucratic level. If, for example, a Minister wants to appoint her cousin whose experience is to be a party hack and a small claims lawyer as CEO of the Transportation Ministry - well, in that case you would expect the Knesset to stop her as part of parliamentary oversight. But when the government consists of the most corrupt people you know + neo nazis, or even just a pretty comfortable majority with leadership that doesn't mind some corruption, the Knesset simply won't do anything, because the government has a majority there by default. Since that's the case, the reasonability clause allows the courts to tell the government - nah, you went too far, this is highly unreasonable. If you research what this was employed for, it was always overwhelmingly positive results. Does anyone who's not a total sycophant think that it's ok that Deri return to the same Ministry where he did corruption and was convicted for it TWICE?

[Upper Canada Tory]

Why is it that the Israeli legislature is legally sovereign? I know very little about the creation of the governmental structures of Israel, but it seems that it was an odd decision to allow a simple legislative majority to make all laws.

It's a heavily modified Westminster system. Including the uncodified constitution!

Emphasis on heavily modified. Israel has a very unusual Westminster-inspired system.

Though I think the parliamentary supremacy stems from the fact that Israel doesn't have a codified constitution. In that situation parliamentary supremacy is normally the assumed system, I would imagine.

In my own country, Canada, we pretty much copy and pasted the original Westminster system, except we generally have judicial supremacy over parliamentary supremacy, but even this comes with some asterisks (the Notwithstanding Clause allows legislatures temporarily overrule parts of the Charter for a 5 year period of time).

Israeli liberals essentially want a system of judicial supremacy similar to that of the Canadian or US system, where the Supreme Court has the power to rule on the constitutionality of laws, except without a codified constitution itself, which makes it somewhat of a strange position in Israel's context and likely subject to vague and arbitrary interpretations of Israel's Basic Laws.

Israeli right-wingers, on the other hand, want a system more like the UK and other European countries where parliamentary supremacy is the law of the land and the power of the legislature is less inhibited. In the most literal sense, this is the more democratic system, as however people vote turns out to be the end result, but also may create a 'tyranny of the majority' dynamic, as Israeli liberals don't like the fact that the right, which is currently in power, may choose to impose laws on them they disagree with, such as of a religious nature, for example.

In many ways it reminds of how different democracies work. Australia, Singapore and many countries in Europe have a more collectively imposed view of democracy - if the majority agrees on something, it must be imposed on everyone (compulsory voting in Australia for example). Canada, US and many other more liberal democracies prioritize the rights of the individual.

[DavidB.]

The real tipping point here is the next election. Netanyahu will almost definitely lose at this point. The question is if he intends to turn this new, more powerful government apparatus over to a center-left coalition that will eviscerate his legacy, or if he'll attempt to use his new, more powerful government apparatus to seize power. If it's the former, Israel will remain a stable democracy but one more susceptible to risky legislative shifts with each election.

The former option is literally the only option. This is Israel we're talking about. People who seriously believe there could be a right-wing sort of coup have been reading foreign liberal media way too much. Besides, the right don't even need a coup to take power, they just need to keep the demographic pace up and things will sort themselves out in a decade or two - at least within the Jewish segment of Israeli society.

The steelman of the "end of Israeli democracy" messaging is that, if a country democratically abandons liberal democracy, a democratic abandon of democracy itself may not be far behind. I am very sympathetic to this case, although I would argue that the fact that literally hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in Area C alone are subject to Israeli civil and military authority without any voice in its government, let alone in their being subject to said authority, by itself calls Israeli democracy into question.

The reality, of course, is that it is messaging targeted at center-right Israelis and at Americans. But even then, messaging is just how politics works. You need to be able to explain to a population that might not intuitively understand the distinction between democracy and liberal democracy why they ought to oppose this reform.

Yeah, I agree with all of this. I think risks to liberal democracy are, you know, very very very bad, not just risks to "democracy" in the (as Cathcon once put it) "you vote for who you like and if they win they get in" sense. I don't think DavidB's semantic point actually works as an argument against this and I wasn't trying to suggest that it does by conceding it; quite the contrary.

I'll bite, because this is the core of the debate. I don't think my point is semantic at all.  I think that in the post-WWII consensus we have seen democracy in the Cathcon definition erode everywhere; instead, governments barely have any "policy bandwidth" anymore and democracy has been hollowed out by international treaties, international organizations, big capital overseas (which tends to control governments rather than governments controlling them, as it used to be in a less globalized era), and the privatization of former state assets. Across the West, democracy is indeed in danger - but it's in danger because it doesn't really matter anymore who you vote for, you always get sort of the same policy. In other words: pushing for the "liberal" against the "democratic" part in "liberal democracy" simply creates a technocracy, whose policies can be widely out of line with the will of the people. I find it refreshing that the Israeli government is attempting to buck this trend and strengthen the democratic pillar within their liberal democracy.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Why is it that the Israeli legislature is legally sovereign? I know very little about the creation of the governmental structures of Israel, but it seems that it was an odd decision to allow a simple legislative majority to make all laws.

It's a heavily modified Westminster system. Including the uncodified constitution!

Israel should just have a system where it has the President appoint justices to the Supreme Court and given the President is not part of parliament, it still preserves checks and balances.

The judicial branch also needs checks and one way to put a check on it is by having one of the other branches appoint justices and the other confirm appointments.

Well, the president just appointing judges would entrust a single individual with more power than a legislative body as a whole. Today I'd certainly have a lot more faith in Herzog than Bibi's far-right cabinet and their enablers in parliament, though that may change with new elections.

Well you could have the Knesset be required to approve all appointments

Are you aware that almost literally no other country on the planet envies the American judicial appointments system?

Sure but that doenst refute the fact that our system of appointing justices is way better than Israel where there are no checks whatsoever on the judicial system . They don’t even have a written constitution so their judicial system is literally just legislating from the bench