Justice Minister Yariv Levin said the government was "exacting the will of the people" by continuing to push forward with controversial judicial reform legislation that has split the country apart before October 7, and is being advanced alongside the continuing Israel-Hamas War and all of the troubles that come along with it.
The comments come at the pinnacle of the tensions between the judiciary and the rest of the government. The latest amalgamation of a legal blockage by the legal advisory was by Attorney-General Gali Baharav Miara against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's dismissal of Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) chief Ronen Bar, a move she said was illegal and improper.
Levin made the comments at a right-wing protest which took place in front of the Supreme Court building in Jerusalem on Thursday evening. Tens of thousands of people attended.
Other government officials in attendance were Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi (Likud), National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir (Otzma Yehudit), Education Minister Yoav Kisch (Likud), Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich (Religious Zionist Party) and Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu (Otzma Yehudit).
Reasoning for the judicial reform
Karhi said, "To be at the whim of [Supreme Court Chief Justice] Isaac Amit and [Attorney-General] Gali Bahrav-Miara is not a democracy. Majority rules!"
He added, "We are here to tell the High Court of Justice and to the judiciary as a whole: No! No to control over the many by a minority... The control of democracy is determined at the ballot, not in the halls of the Supreme Court, and the ballot is what they [the judiciary] are trying to turn irrelevant, to empty the State from its Jewish core."
Levin said, "We are here, for the people, not against them. We are for a state that is democratic and Jewish. the people decide, not you."