contents
Right-wing voters in Israel do not necessarily welcome the prime minister’s far-reaching reform plans. Voices from Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.
Wednesday evening in the Mahane Yehuda quarters in Jerusalem: It is the day before the deadly Israeli military operation in the Palestinian city of Jenin and two days before the attack on a synagogue in east Jerusalem. No one can yet know of the 18 dead and two dozen injured in just two days.
The mood in this Netanyahu stronghold is relaxed. Some responded with humor to the survey on Netanyahu’s planned judicial reform. Daniel Ashuri, for example, a Netanyahu supporter who can imitate his Prime Minister “Bibi” well: “We are making a judicial revolution! I wish all citizens of Israel success and God’s blessings – Bibi is with you!”
Ashuri thinks the judicial reform is right and overdue: “The judiciary is corrupt and he is putting it on hold. The judiciary wants to frame him for corruption, but they won’t succeed.” Is Netanyahu wrongly on trial over corruption charges? “Netanyahu is the least corrupt – the others are more corrupt,” Ashuri replies.
Netanyahu is the least corrupt – the others are more corrupt.
The judiciary does not have a good reputation in this right-wing conservative district. Every time Parliament passes a law, the Supreme Court overrules it, says an elderly gentleman who shops at the market: “It can’t be that the judiciary has more say than the parliamentary majority.” In the future, according to Netanyahu’s plans, a simple majority would suffice to overrule even decisions of the highest court.
Legend:
The Mahane Yehuda quarters in Jerusalem are a stronghold of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
SRF
The people in this neighborhood resent the courts for indicting their prime minister. They perceive it as a witch hunt by the left.
The other voice of the right
Lawyer Eliad Shraga in Tel Aviv sees things very differently. He is the founder and chairman of the “Movement for Quality Government in Israel”, an influential organization that fights corruption – repeatedly before the Supreme Court.
“Netanyahu is only doing it because he wants to escape justice,” says 63-year-old Shraga. Together with his fascist partners, he undermined Israel’s liberal democracy and turned it into a fascist dictatorship.
Together with his fascist partners, Netanyahu has undermined liberal democracy and turned it into a fascist dictatorship.
Fascist? Did the Jewish lawyer really address this word to other Jews? ‘Yes, unfortunately that is the truth. But you have to call a spade a spade,” says Shraga. He fears that this government will determine the law alone in the future.
“I’m telling you this as a representative of the political right,” adds the 63-year-old, distancing himself from both the left and the right-wing extremists in the government: “Especially as Jews, we cannot accept such tendencies.”
I say this to you as a representative of the political right. Especially as Jews we cannot accept such tendencies.
The vehemence with which Shraga has reacted to the upheaval in the Israeli judiciary may come as a shock to European ears. But the term “fascist” is currently used by many Jews in Israel for Netanyahu’s governing coalition. Even right-wing voters, of whom between 17 and 20 percent are against a weakening of the judiciary.
In the Mahane Yehuda Quarter in Jerusalem, Netanyahu supporters know they are in the majority. Netanyahu impersonator Daniel Ashuri sees no danger to Israel’s democracy. He says goodbye in Netanyahu’s voice. «Goodbye Switzerland. Bring Swiss chocolate and champagne with you on your next visit,” he scoffs, referring to one of “Bibi’s” alleged corruption affairs.