The Executive Council of Aus­trali­an Jewry (the ECAJ), the peak rep­res­ent­at­ive body of the Aus­trali­an Jewish community, has voiced its concerns about the Knesset’s decision to abolish the Israeli Supreme Court’s power to overturn gov­ern­ment decisions and appoint­ments it deems “unreas­on­able”.

“Regard­less of one’s views about the merits or otherwise of the various com­pon­ents of the judicial overhaul’ in Israel, the manner in which the removal of the Supreme Court’s ability to apply a “reas­on­able­ness test” has been steam-rollered into law is shredding Israel’s social consensus and adversely impacting on Israel’s inter­na­tion­al repu­ta­tion”, said ECAJ President Jillian Segal.

“Israelis of all political stripes have taken to the streets to protest these changes. The situation demands a com­prom­ise, as called for by Israel’s President. It is a supreme irony that as we approach Tisha B’Av, the hard lessons of Jewish history about the dangers of internal disunity seem to have been forgotten.”

Ms Segal added, “In every mature democracy there are con­straints on the powers of the elected gov­ern­ment, usually in the form of a Con­sti­tu­tion, a par­lia­ment­ary upper house of review and acknow­ledged con­ven­tions. Israel has no such restraints. The Courts provide the only checks and balances. Even if a gov­ern­ment is demo­crat­ic­ally elected, if it has untram­melled powers that can ride roughshod over fun­da­ment­al rights and freedoms, this does not equate with democracy. It is well past time for the Israeli gov­ern­ment to call a halt to the judicial overhaul and to search in earnest for a consensus, as President Herzog has called for.”