TEL AVIV: Tens of thousands of Israelis joined protests across the country on Saturday against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s bitterly disputed plans to tighten controls on the Supreme Court.
The planned overhaul, which would give the government control over naming judges to the Supreme Court and let parliament override many rulings, was paused after opponents organized some of the biggest street protests ever seen in Israel, now in their 18th consecutive week.
The government accuses activist judges of increasingly usurping the role of parliament, and says the overhaul is needed to restore balance between the judiciary and elected politicians.
Critics say it will remove vital checks and balances underpinning a democratic state and hand unchecked power to the government.
Five months into the far-right coalition’s term, 74 percent of Israelis think the government is functioning poorly, according to a poll released by the Israeli public broadcaster on Friday.
Crowds gathered in central Tel Aviv on Saturday in a show of defiance against plans which they see as an existential threat to Israeli democracy.
Israel’s Channel 12 estimated 110,000 people demonstrated in Tel Aviv alone, with other demonstrations held in cities across the country.
“I’m very worried for my country,” protester Bental Shamir, a 60-year old teacher told Reuters in Tel Aviv. “I don’t want a corrupted country.”
The planned overhaul has been put on hold in an attempt to give time for Israeli President Isaac Herzog, who plays a largely ceremonial role, to broker a compromise between the coalition and opposition which could see the legislation softened, but so far compromise talks have not born fruit.
“I’m sure that we are closer than we can imagine,” lawyer Dor Lasker, 35, told Reuters regarding the compromise talks. “I’m positive that it could happen.”
Protesters waved the blue and white Israeli flags that have become a hallmark of the protests over the past three months.
A statement from the Israeli president’s office said King Charles III greeted Herzog after the coronation ceremony in London and commended him for his mediation efforts.
Israelis protest against judicial reforms for 18th week
https://arab.news/gbf77
Israelis protest against judicial reforms for 18th week
- Crowds gather in Tel Aviv against government's plan to tighten controls on top court
- Israeli government accuses activist judges of increasingly usurping parliament's role
RSF destroying evidence of atrocities in Sudan: report
- Humanitarian Research Lab said the group “destroyed and concealed evidence of its widespread mass killings” in the North Darfur state capital
- In the aftermath of the takeover, it had identified 150 clusters of objects consistent with human remains
PORT SUDAN: Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces group has undertaken systematic mass killing and body disposal in the overrun Darfur city of El-Fasher, a new report has found.
Yale University’s Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL), which has used satellite imagery to monitor atrocities since the RSF’s war with the army began, said on Tuesday the group “destroyed and concealed evidence of its widespread mass killings” in the North Darfur state capital.
The RSF’s violent takeover of the army’s last holdout position in the Darfur region in October led to international outrage over reports of summary executions, systematic rape and mass detention.
The HRL said that in the aftermath of the takeover, it had identified 150 clusters of objects consistent with human remains.
Dozens were consistent with reports of execution-style killings, and dozens more with reports of the RSF killing civilians as they fled.
Within a month, nearly 60 of those clusters were no longer visible, while eight earth disturbances appeared near the sites of mass killing, the HRL said.
It said the disturbances were not consistent with civilian burial practices.
“Largescale and systematic mass killing and body disposal has occurred,” the report determined, estimating the death toll in the city to be in the tens of thousands.
Aid groups and the UN have repeatedly demanded safe access to El-Fasher, where communications remain cut and an estimated tens of thousands of survivors are trapped, many detained by the RSF.
There is no confirmed death toll from the Sudan war which began in April 2023, with estimates at more than 150,000.
Sudan’s de facto leader General Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan leads the army while the RSF is headed by his former deputy, Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo.
The fighting has also displaced millions of people, and created the world’s largest hunger and displacement crises.
Efforts to end the war have repeatedly faltered.
