Herzog: Divisions Tearing Israel Apart
TEL AVIV – Israeli president Isaac Herzog said Sunday that the occupying entity is in the midst of a division that is tearing it apart. His remarks came as tens of thousands demonstrated in Tel Aviv on Saturday evening to protest plans by the new prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to overhaul the legal system. The protesters carried banners denouncing Netanyahu’s “cabinet of shame”. Similar rallies against Netanyahu held in al-quds and Haifa
“This conflict worries me deeply, as it worries many across Israel and the Diaspora,” Herzog said in a statement on Twitter.
Herzog has come under fire for avoiding clarifying his position on the proposed judicial reforms.
“I respect the criticism towards me, but I am now focused on two critical roles that I believe I bear as president at this hour: averting a historic constitutional crisis and stopping the continued rift within” the occupying regime, Herzog said.
Proposed by so-called justice minister Yariv Levin, the reforms, if enacted, would be the most radical change ever in the system of regime in the occupied territories.
The planned changes would severely limit the power of the supreme court, give the regime the power to choose judges, and end the appointment of legal advisers to ministries by the attorney general.