Hardly. Israel has been running an apartheid system for decades now, but only now that Netanyahu is going to influence the courts to negatively affect Israelis and not just Palestinians, suddenly Israelis are up in arms.
Netanyahu’s plans are bad and will worsen everything, but the system was already undemocratic to begin with. Courts already denied rights to Palestinians and held minors without access to lawyers, detaining some Palestinians for years to decades without trial. The courts upheld demolition of Palestinian families homes without due process and then when Palestinians petitioned for the same punishment for Israeli terrorists the courts declined to intervene.
Edit: also this judicial change opens Israel up to even more charges of crimes against humanity, as judicial checks and balances are eliminated it means the government is more strictly responsible for human rights abuses.
It is an incredibly low bar for a nation to finally draw the line because citizens can foresee how ongoing descent into belligerent populist illiberal authoritarianism eventually reaches the stage where it personally screws over they and theirs. Alas, looking at recent world history, I don’t know if we can take even that for granted. So, uh, yay.
EDIT: I recommend the article, it really touches and expands on this theme.
To fear for the future of Israeli democracy is not to pretend that it was perfect before Netanyahu: how could it be when the occupation of Palestinian territory is now in its 57th year? To quote the slogan of one wing of the protest movement: “Democracy and occupation cannot coexist.” And yet, that cannot be an excuse for inaction: Netanyahu’s judicial coup will make things worse, including and especially for Palestinians. But it also matters to those who are a long way from Israel-Palestine and have no direct stake in it. For this is part of a wider struggle against what is now, somewhat paradoxically, an international phenomenon: ultranationalist populism.
Hardly. Israel has been running an apartheid system for decades now, but only now that Netanyahu is going to influence the courts to negatively affect Israelis and not just Palestinians, suddenly Israelis are up in arms.
Netanyahu’s plans are bad and will worsen everything, but the system was already undemocratic to begin with. Courts already denied rights to Palestinians and held minors without access to lawyers, detaining some Palestinians for years to decades without trial. The courts upheld demolition of Palestinian families homes without due process and then when Palestinians petitioned for the same punishment for Israeli terrorists the courts declined to intervene.
Edit: also this judicial change opens Israel up to even more charges of crimes against humanity, as judicial checks and balances are eliminated it means the government is more strictly responsible for human rights abuses.
Yep, that’s the lesson.
Pick one:
Can’t have both.
It is an incredibly low bar for a nation to finally draw the line because citizens can foresee how ongoing descent into belligerent populist illiberal authoritarianism eventually reaches the stage where it personally screws over they and theirs. Alas, looking at recent world history, I don’t know if we can take even that for granted. So, uh, yay.
EDIT: I recommend the article, it really touches and expands on this theme.