{"id":11390,"date":"2023-08-07T15:50:03","date_gmt":"2023-08-07T15:50:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=11390"},"modified":"2023-08-07T15:50:03","modified_gmt":"2023-08-07T15:50:03","slug":"what-israels-new-judicial-law-reveals-about-its-democracy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=11390","title":{"rendered":"What Israel\u2019s new judicial law reveals about its democracy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\n\n“The new law eliminates courts\u2019 power to overturn decisions by Israel\u2019s Cabinet or its ministers that they find to be \u201cextremely unreasonable,\u201d a vague-sounding standard that has a more technical meaning in Israeli law. In the simplest terms, the reasonableness doctrine allows the courts to overturn policies<\/a> when the government can\u2019t prove that its decisions were made according to some basic standards of fair and just policymaking<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Such a standard for judicial review might seem overbroad in the United States. But it\u2019s actually relatively common internationally<\/a>, and Israel in particular has a need for it: The country lacks a formal constitution, significant separation of executive and legislative powers, and a federal system. The courts are basically the only check on decisions made by the elected government \u2014 and the current government, a far-right coalition led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, is trying to weaken the judiciary\u2019s powers and pack it with ideologically friendly jurists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Eliminating reasonableness review of Cabinet decisions is \u201conly part of a far bigger plan to gut checks on executive power in Israel,\u201d writes Natan Sachs<\/a>, director of the Brookings Institution\u2019s Center for Middle East Policy. Other components of this plan are currently waiting in the wings, likely next steps for the government in the coming weeks and months. If they too are passed, Sachs writes, Netanyahu\u2019s government would possess \u201cthe ability to do almost anything.\u201d”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Reasonableness is not the only tool Israeli courts have to overturn government policies; its elimination marks an increase in government power, but it is hardly the end of judicial review. By passing this reform alone, rather than packaged with even more radical components of the initial overhaul, Netanyahu lowered the risk of defections from his four-vote majority. (The new law passed 64-0, after opposition lawmakers walked out of the vote in protest.)”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/www.vox.com\/2023\/7\/24\/23805532\/israel-judicial-overhaul-reasonableness<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“The new law eliminates courts\u2019 power to overturn decisions by Israel\u2019s Cabinet or its ministers that they find to be \u201cextremely unreasonable,\u201d a vague-sounding standard that has a more technical meaning in Israeli law. In the simplest terms, the reasonableness doctrine allows the courts to overturn policies when the government can\u2019t prove that its decisions were made according to some basic standards of fair and just policymaking.
\nSuch a standard for judicial review might seem overbroad in the United States. But it\u2019s actually relatively common internationally, and Israel in particular has a need for it: The country lacks a formal constitution, significant separation of executive and legislative powers, and a federal system. The courts are basically the only check on decisions made by the elected government \u2014 and the current government, a far-right coalition led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, is trying to weaken the judiciary\u2019s powers and pack it with ideologically friendly jurists.<\/p>\n

Eliminating reasonableness review of Cabinet decisions is \u201conly part of a far bigger plan to gut checks on executive power in Israel,\u201d writes Natan Sachs, director of the Brookings Institution\u2019s Center for Middle East Policy. Other components of this plan are currently waiting in the wings, likely next steps for the government in the coming weeks and months. If they too are passed, Sachs writes, Netanyahu\u2019s government would possess \u201cthe ability to do almost anything.\u201d”<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“Reasonableness is not the only tool Israeli courts have to overturn government policies; its elimination marks an increase in government power, but it is hardly the end of judicial review. By passing this reform alone, rather than packaged with even more radical components of the initial overhaul, Netanyahu lowered the risk of defections from his four-vote majority. (The new law passed 64-0, after opposition lawmakers walked out of the vote in protest.)”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[1104,790,431,194,1213],"class_list":["post-11390","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article-share","tag-authoritarianism","tag-courts","tag-democracy","tag-israel","tag-judiciary"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11390","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11390"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11390\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11391,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11390\/revisions\/11391"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11390"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11390"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11390"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}