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| Biden: ‘Don’t rush’ to legislate judicial overhaul. ‘Current proposal becoming more divisive, not less’ | |
| 2023-07-24 | |
Golly, he sure feels strongly about this — goodness knows he’s mentioned it often enough. [IsraelTimes] President Biden urges Netanyahu and his coalition not to move ahead with the imminent legislation of the first bill in the planned judicial overhaul.In a statement to Axios and Walla! journalist Barak Ravid, ...in other words, a news site Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu — not to mention the rest of Israel’s voters — would never see. Talk about ineffective communication! Biden says, "It looks like the current judicial reform proposal is becoming more divisive...politicians call things divisivewhen when the other side sez something they don't like. Their own statements are never divisive,they're principled... , not less." "Given the range of threats and challenges confronting Israel right now, it doesn’t make sense for Israeli leaders to rush this — the focus should be on pulling people together and finding consensus," the president says. More from a longer Times of Israel article on the subject: Just last week, Biden issued a statement to The New York Times in which he said, “This is obviously an area about which Israelis have strong views, including in an enduring protest movement that is demonstrating the vibrancy of Israel’s democracy, which must remain the core of our bilateral relationship.The protest movement endures because of US State Department support on the orders of the Biden administration. Take away that support and it would collapse like a sand castle during an earthquake. “Finding consensus on controversial areas of policy means taking the time you need,” he continued. “For significant changes, that’s essential. So my recommendation to Israeli leaders is not to rush. I believe the best outcome is to continue to seek the broadest possible consensus here.”But Netanyahu did not alter course and told Biden in a phone call a day before the president gave the statement to the Times that the opposition isn’t interested in compromise and that he would be going ahead with the legislation curtailing judicial review without the broad consensus he once assured Washington that he would secure. “We won. Get over it.” The Israeli premier told Biden, however, that he would seek more widespread support for subsequent parts of the overhaul, which would be passed later this year.It took until last week’s phone call for Biden to agree to meet with Netanyahu, following seven months of refraining from such a sit-down due to the administration’s ongoing displeasure with the judicial overhaul plans and Jerusalem’s policies in the West Bank. Seven months of spleen-venting, to no avail. Way to demonstrate how important America is in your watch, President Biden! Amid the growing protests within the military, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant was said to working to try and delay the Knesset vote on the reasonableness bill and work toward a "wide consensus" that will "ensure the security of the State of Israel, while leaving the IDF separate from political discourse."The defense minister was instrumental in getting the controversial overhaul paused in late March. After calling for a halt to the legislation in a public address, he was fired by Netanyahu, leading to massive protests, a nationwide labor strike and the shuttering of Ben Gurion airport. Netanyahu temporarily suspended the legislation, agreed to talks with the opposition under Herzog’s aegis that have since broken down, and eventually reinstated Gallant. This time, Channel 12 reported Friday, Gallant was trying to work within the political system to try and defuse the crisis. In a follow-up report on Sunday, Channel 12 said Netanyahu immediately called Defense Minister Yoav Gallant after his efforts on a compromise were reported by the network on Friday and angrily told the defense minister to back off. "You think your proposal can be beneficial but it does great harm. Stop acting like you’re the prime minister. I’m handling the incident, stop interfering," Netanyahu was reported by Channel 12 to have told Gallant during their call.
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| Posted by:trailing wife |
| #13 Never play the other guy's game. Never play a game where you never get to shuffle cut or deal. Never play a game where the rules are like trying to nail down a blob of mercury. Leftists love "democracy" until the vote does not go their way. I believe here in America, if everything was decided by plebiscite, the leftists would be horrified by the results most of the time. |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2023-07-24 18:34 |
| #12 ^ Thank you. I think many of us that support Israel figured that the bad crew was on one side of this. I was trying to determine which side Netanyahu was on. Often the leftists are the ones fiddling with the courts. This is an unfiddle. You have cleared it up. |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2023-07-24 18:30 |
| #11 Kritarchy, rule by judge, does have a history in Judea. |
| Posted by: magpie 2023-07-24 18:27 |
| #10 Or the anti-Trump P*ssy marches, Super Hose. The leaders of this thing also led the last N anti-Bibi “movements” — they’re pros. About the resonableness standard from the Daily Wire: The 64-0 vote, with all members of the right-wing bloc voting for the amendment and all members of the opposition boycotting the vote, was to curb the nation’s “reasonableness standard.” That standard enabled judges in Israel to apply a “reasonableness standard” to block decisions by elected officials that they believe are beyond the scope of what a responsible and reasonable authority would do. The standard thereby gave the justices a de facto veto on most if not all government policies. The Israeli Supreme Court has always been dominated by leftists, and unlike the United States and other Western countries, enables justices on the court to pick their successors, thus giving the Left permanent control of the judiciary and thus control over government decisions. This bill is the first step toward giving control to a government elected by an increasingly conservative citizenry. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2023-07-24 18:16 |
| #9 ^Thank you. So the protests are like our Dobbs mayhem. |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2023-07-24 18:09 |
| #8 In all I've read about this I still have no idea about what the problem with "reasonableness" is. in Israel, who is trying to sand-bag whom. Israel’s judiciary is primarily leftwing, AlanC, and they’ve been very pro-active about blocking government initiatives when Bibi Netanyahu and the center-right are in power. That’s part of the reason they keep having elections. As far as I can tell, the reasonableness thing is a requirement that judges rule on actual texts of the law, not what they from their leftwing perspective believe to be how the law ought to have been written. What exactly is Joe's standing in all this? The powerful president of America, and the claim of being Israel’s only supporter in the entire world — a warning that support will be withdrawn if Israel does not do as it is told. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2023-07-24 17:12 |
| #7 I thought it wasn't good to interfere in other countries' internal affairs? What exactly is Joe's standing in all this? |
| Posted by: Tom 2023-07-24 15:51 |
| #6 MM, I got my degree, more than 50 yrs ago, in Government / Poli Sci. So I'm "reasonably" familiar with the general issue. What I don't understand is, in Israel, who is trying to sand-bag whom. |
| Posted by: AlanC 2023-07-24 15:11 |
| #5 "Democracy" is not unelected individuals unilaterally pulling the rug of the constitution out from under the electorate on a whim. So, all the screeching is in fact a case of "You keep using that word. I do not think that word means what you think it means." |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2023-07-24 09:52 |
| #4 The job of a judge is to see that the law - as written - is followed scrupulously. Making it up as you go along is not that at all. If a law is unconstitutional, let the supreme legal authority of the land strike it down. If the legislature wants to reinstate it, let them retool it to meet the requirements of constitutionality. The death penalty in the US is a textbook example of the process from start to finish. |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2023-07-24 09:49 |
| #3 ^ It's utterly subjective. One man's reasonableness is another's utter insanity. |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2023-07-24 09:46 |
| #2 In all I've read about this I still have no idea about what the problem with "reasonableness" is. Is there a short answer tp that? |
| Posted by: AlanC 2023-07-24 09:43 |
| #1 'Don't Rush' - see Obamacare One set of rules for me, another set of rules for thee. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2023-07-24 07:51 |