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ISRAEL – A gigantic mobilization. Amid sweltering heat, thousands of demonstrators continued their march and arrived in Jerusalem this Saturday, July 22, to protest against the proposed law reforming Israel’s judicial system.
As the Times of Israel reports, Tuesday’s protest began with a handful of people in Tel Aviv wanting to join the Jerusalem-based Knesset parliament. And day by day the ranks of the mobilization continued to grow, forming a human tide, as you can see in the video at the top of the article.
As final voting approaches, the walkers began their final leg this Saturday, forming a line several kilometers long along the roads leading to the capital. After their arrival in Jerusalem, more demonstrators are likely to join them in the next few hours.
And if a regrouping of opponents in Jerusalem’s Gan Sacher Park is planned for an indefinite period, other demonstrations will also be organized in front of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s residence or on Kaplan Street in Tel Aviv, the Israeli newspaper reports.
Because the debates begin on Sunday in Parliament before the vote scheduled for Monday. If passed, it would be the first major piece of judicial reform to go into effect.
historical dispute
According to the government, one of the aims of the reform is to rebalance power relations by reducing the prerogatives of the Supreme Court, which the executive sees as politicized, in favor of parliament. However, its critics believe that above all it is likely to pave the way for an anti-liberal or authoritarian tendency.
“We will continue to fight unless this extremist government disappears,” Guy Maidan told AFP on Saturday, who has been marching from Tel Aviv to the seat of parliament in Jerusalem since Wednesday.
On Thursday evening, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his door remained “open” for negotiations with the opposition after a parliamentary committee approved a key measure of this controversial project. But not enough to demobilize opponents of the bill, as the project’s announcement in January sparked one of the largest protest movements in the country’s history.
A movement that was also to be followed by 1,142 Israeli Air Force reservists. They have actually threatened to suspend their volunteer service if the Knesset passes the bill early next week. Therefore, any legislation applied in an “unreasonable” manner would “endanger my willingness to continue risking my life and force me, with great sadness, to suspend my voluntary reserve service,” the signatories declared, calling on the government to preserve “the independence” of the judicial system.
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