A senior government official told me this week that "if we are going to be stuck in this judicial reform quagmire, the government will have nothing to show for in terms of accomplishments, nor will there be a government."
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This sentiment is shared by a double-digit number of people in the Likud, Shas, and United Torah Judaism Coalition members, as well as by some in Otzma Yehudit and the Religious Zionist Party. Justice Minister Yariv Levin, of course, is not one of them.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu knows he can freeze the judicial reform because most of its main backers have grown wary of this legislative push. In fact, they got tired of it several months ago. But the prime minister wants such a move to be coordinated with the Opposition so that the protests die down. State Party leader Benny Gantz has shut the door on this because Netanyahu has been all over the place, and now Netanyahu will try to reach a unilateral compromise.
So long as the government is consumed by the judicial reform, it will not be able to address the existential questions Israel faces, which are only worsening by the day.
The Eritreans' riots in south Tel Aviv were a rude awakening for this reality. The rising number of murders in Arab society is about to break another record, and the challenges facing law and order in the Negev and Galilee — this cannot wait. It's no coincidence that Gantz delivered a campaign-style speech this week because if nothing changes in how the government operates, it will eventually march to its end.
Yes, the protesters are not the people's voice necessarily; they correlate with the voters who elected the Opposition parties. They don't represent the majority of Jews. But it has managed to have a crippling effect on the country's proper functioning ranging from the economy to the military. It's not easy admitting this, but government officials have been privately conceding that the protesters have gotten what they asked for: They have managed to paralyze the government and prevent it from pursuing its policy goals and created an atmosphere that gets massive support from the media.
Thus, Netanyahu has apparently resolved to go ahead with Gant. He is poised to announce a freeze on judicial reform so that he can get rid of the background noise that has been hampering his progress on other issues. But even if he accomplishes that, he has another headache around the corner: The Haredi parties are eager to pass a law that would secure the blanket exemption from military service for ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students, perhaps as early as this fall and would prevent any progress on other matters until this is done.
Netanyahu's inner orbit hopes that the next few Knesset sessions spanning some 12 months would be dedicated to security matters, fighting crime, diplomatic breakthroughs, as well as initiatives that would cater to right-wing voters. This would hopefully make sure they don't hurry to give up their seats at the government table. If Dudi Amsalem already believes this is the right path, it is now Justice Minister Yariv Levin's time to fall in line.
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