In the war of words over Israel’s judicial reform, irrespective of the rights and wrongs of the disputants, the word “democracy” appears to have suffered a bit of a roughing-up.
Israel
Throwing Israel Under The Bus Plays Well In Ottawa & Academic Circles
Canada must rethink its friendship with Israel
This week, the Israeli parliament approved a controversial law that constrains the Supreme Court’s ability to provide judicial oversight of government actions. According to many critics, this is only the first step in a plan by the coalition government led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to concentrate power in the executive branch. The Netanyahu government, which includes Jewish supremacists and is the most extreme in the country’s history, has also taken steps, and will likely take additional ones, toward Israel’s further annexation of the West Bank.
I can’t wait till they conflate Israeli Supremacism with White Supremacism.
Worth reading an opposing opinion on the Judicial flap in Israel which to my view resembles the Canadian public’s dismay with our own unsolicited judicial activism. Well some of the Canadian public’s dismay.
The truth about the Israeli protests
This elitist, anti-democratic movement wants to constrain the power of the Israeli parliament.
On Monday night, amid large-scale protests, the Israeli Knesset (parliament) passed the first part of the government’s judicial-reform package.
The ‘reasonableness’ bill, which passed 64-0, is designed to curb the sweeping powers of Israel’s Supreme Court. As Jeremy Sharon has outlined in Times of Israel, using the tool of ‘reasonableness’, the Israeli Supreme Court has been able to strike down the actions of elected ministers or officials as ‘unreasonable’. It can do this even if those actions ‘do not violate any particular law or contradict other administrative rulings’. If it becomes law – incredibly, the Supreme Court could still declare the reasonableness bill to be ‘unreasonable’ – that will no longer be possible.
‘Fight for a future’: protests against Netanyahu’s law engulf Israel
Protesters pitched tents and took to the streets of Jerusalem in their thousands on Sunday as part of a last-ditch attempt to halt the plans of Binyamin Netanyahu, the prime minister, to pass a law limiting the powers of the Supreme Court.
In a pilgrimage born of necessity, a throng of demonstrators marched on Jerusalem to set up camp near the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, and take part in a four-day protest along the steep approaches to the city . Hundreds of thousands of others across the country mobilised to protest against the government’s controversial vote on Monday.
Update: Israeli parliament approves key part of judicial overhaul that has exposed deep fissures in society
Israel and the new America
It’s time to wean Israel off U.S. military aid.
On the surface, Israeli President Isaac Herzog’s visit to the White House on Tuesday felt like old times. U.S. President Joe Biden warmly greeted Israel’s ceremonial head of state and repeatedly stated that the U.S.’s commitment to Israel is “ironclad.” Biden mentioned that he spoke with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the day before and arranged a visit for Israel’s actual leader.
So, are we back to normal? Were the last seven months of unprecedented U.S. hostility towards Israel, its elected government, its parliamentary deliberations, its senior ministers and its prime minister a blip on the screen, now undone?
I’m sure Netanyahu is all busted up about it …
Israel’s Netanyahu not on Trudeau’s invite list despite proposed U.S. visit
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says he is not currently planning to join the American president in inviting his Israeli counterpart for a visit.
“We remain steadfast friends of Israel, but every now and then we do have to point out where we disagree,” Trudeau told reporters Thursday.
Trudeau is slated to speak with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu soon, after months of strain between the two countries.
Biden’s Anti-Semitism Czar Condemns Israel, Not Anti-Semites
In the early days of June, Deborah Lipstadt, Biden’s antisemitism czar, flew to the United Arab Emirates and condemned Israel’s government while claiming that she worries that the Netanyahu government’s defense of Jews against Islamic terrorism might worsen antisemitism.
This was exactly the kind of excuse for antisemitism that the new White House strategy on antisemitism that she was touting was supposed to stop. Instead, the antisemitism czar promoting the antisemitism strategy was falling into the same kind of behavior.
Canada calls on Israel to reverse thousands of West Bank settlement approvals
The Canadian government has joined a chorus of allies condemning Israel’s approval of more than 5,700 settlement units in the occupied West Bank, a move that comes amid surging violence in the region.
In a joint statement with her Australian and U.K. counterparts Friday, Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly says she is gravely concerned by the move.
“The continued expansion of settlements is an obstacle to peace and negatively impacts efforts to achieve a negotiated two-state solution,” says the statement.
Avi Benlolo: Liberal pledge of $100M to UNRWA makes Canada complicit in terrorism
Canada has reaffirmed its complicity in the murder of Israelis by renewing its aid to the Palestinians through the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) to the tune of $100 million over the next four years, in addition to an immediate $3 million in so-called emergency aid.
Twice as many Israelis died in one month of Biden as in one year of Trump
2023 looks on track to be the deadliest year in Israel since 2015, under Obama, and the bloodshed is an eightfold increase in Israeli deaths since Trump’s last year in office.
The Biden administration restored Obama’s old policies and doubled down on them. And the death toll in Israel looks the way that it did under Obama. Under Biden, Israelis are dying at similar rates to the way that they did under Obama, but not at all as they did under Trump.
Netanyahu signs up to Xi’s Middle East charm offensive
The Israeli PM’s decision to court China comes at a time of tension with the US. The stakes are high
China is engaging in an ambitious programme of diplomacy and peace initiatives, in the Middle East as well as Ukraine, in an effort to establish its credentials as a responsible global power and to exploit differences between the United States and its partners.
The latest object of Chinese attention is the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, who announced this week that he has been invited to make a state visit to Beijing at a time of tension between Israel and the US.
Israeli prime ministers are customarily invited to the White House within weeks of their election. But President Biden is keeping Netanyahu at distance because of the inclusion of far-right parties in his coalition and their attempt to pass laws that would drastically weaken Israel’s Supreme Court.
Manipulating Israeli Public Opinion
Both George Orwell and Mark Twain would have demanded that we take notice.
The results of a recent “trust index” survey, conducted in Israel, revealed far more than just the dry numbers they report — although of course they are important. Even more important are issues concerning public trust — the very core of democracy.
Bimbo Eruption: Melanie Joley Attacks A Black Woman, A Jew and A Preacher
Mélanie Joly’s office upset over Conservative MP Leslyn Lewis and preacher Charles McVety’s plan to host Israeli minister
OTTAWA — Events featuring an Israeli cabinet minister alongside controversial Canadian preacher Charles McVety and a Conservative MP are ruffling feathers in Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly’s office.
Joly’s office only learned about Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli’s planned trip to Canada from other Liberal MPs, who raised questions about it when they received an invite to an event with Chikli on Parliament Hill next week.
Biden’s potential new ambassador to Israel views its founding as a ‘catastrophe’
One of the top candidates to take on the role of ambassador to Israel, now that Thomas Nides is on his way out, is Susie Gelman, who is retiring from her tenure as the chair of the Israel Policy Forum. Gelman professes to love Israel, but she considers its founding a catastrophe and is working hard to undermine its current government. In other words, hers is the “love” of a wifebeater.
Who Wants to Destroy Israel? You Might Be Surprised.
On April 17-18, Israel observed Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Day. Sirens sounded across the country while people stood for two minutes of silence in remembrance of six million Jews who had been murdered. Wreaths were laid at the Yad Vashem World Holocaust Remembrance Center. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivered a speech calling on Israelis for unity.
Why the world has turned against Israel
On the 75th anniversary of Israel’s founding, the right to self-determination has fallen tragically out of favour.
Israel will start celebrating the 75th anniversary of its creation this evening. Given the hatred Israel evokes from Islamists, regional powers and Western leftists, it is remarkable it has survived for so long.
To be sure, Israel has also had substantial international support at times. From the late 1960s onwards, it could rely on America as an ally – although that backing seems to be waning today, particularly among Democrats. It is also often forgotten that left-wingers used to be staunch supporters of Israel. Indeed, from Israel’s foundation in 1948 through the 1960s, the left generally celebrated Israel as an expression of Jews’ right to national self-determination. This began to change in the 1970s, as sections of the left increasingly came to view Israel as an imperialist power. It was only in the 1990s, however, when Western elites started to reject the idea of national self-determination, that support for Israel on the left really began to erode.