The New Yorker Radio Hour - Israel on the Brink: Understanding the Judicial Overhaul, and the Protests Against It

Episode Date: April 7, 2023

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposed law changing the judiciary is described as a reform. To opponents, it’s a move to gut the independence of the Supreme Court as a check on executive power—and a move from the playbook of autocrats like Hungary’s Viktor Orbán. The protests that followed are the largest in the country’s history, and are now stretching into their third month. Ruth Margalit, who is based in Tel Aviv, covered the protests for The New Yorker, and she tells David Remnick that the strength and success of the protests so far has brought a sense of hope for many who were losing faith in the country’s political future. “I think there is a sign of optimism. There is this potential for a kind of political realignment,” she says. “I do have some friends who were thinking of leaving and suddenly are saying, ‘Well, let’s just see how this plays out.’ And they suddenly feel that they have a role.” Remnick also speaks with Margalit’s father, the political philosopher Avishai Margalit, about demographic and cultural factors driving Israeli politics. The nation has been moving to the right probably since the failure of the Oslo peace accords in the nineteen-nineties, but “the new element,” Avishai thinks, “is the strong fusion of religion and nationalism,” elements that were once kept separate in Israel. “The current government is utterly dependent on the votes of the religious and the ultra-religious,” he says. The big unknown, Ruth says, is whether the popular uprising will expand beyond the judicial reforms. “Let’s say the fight over democracy is won—what happens then?” she says. “Can we branch out this fight over democracy? Can it include the West Bank and bring an end to the occupation?” New Yorker Radio Hour listeners, we want to hear from you.  We have a few questions about the show and how you listen to it. The survey takes about twenty minutes, and your feedback will help us make our podcast better.  Take the survey here.

This is The New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker. Welcome to The New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick. A quarter century ago, I wrote a profile in the New Yorker of Benjamin Netanyahu. He was just a couple of years into his very long tenure as Israel's prime minister. As the head of the Conservative Likud Party, Netanyahu had always seemed to me, was influenced by the politics and the communication skills of Ronald Reagan. And he was tacking between the very hardline politics that had formed him, from his family and onward,

and the pragmatic realities of holding on to power. And he was absolutely determined to put an end to the peace process with the Palestinians. But what I don't think anybody anticipated was that a generation later, Netanyahu would again be in power and that democracy itself would be in question. He's pushed a change to the political system that has brought hundreds of people. hundreds of thousands of protesters to the streets, and they fear that Israel is on the brink of becoming an autocracy in the mold of Hungary or Poland.

So this is a very complex subject, and today I want to dig into it to go in depth with two very prominent Israeli writers who are, in fact, family. The journalist Ruth Margolite, who's written for the New Yorker and lives in Tel Aviv, and her father, the philosopher Abishai Margulet, Avishai taught at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and at Princeton.

And when I went on my many reporting trips to Israel, Abishai was frequently my first stop. We spoke last week. So let's bear down on what this debate is about. The term judicial reform kind of sounds like a, I don't know, a technocratic subject for political science majors, but it's brought Israel to a complete standstill. So what does judicial reform actually mean?

mean. What's being proposed by the right wing, which of course has a majority of seats in Knesset in the legislature? And why is that, you know, if it's just reform after all, why is that a question, an existential question about democracy? This first started a week after the swearing in of the new government. And remember, this is the most, you know, ultra-Orthodox, ultra-nationalist government in Israel's history. And they won decisively. Netanyahu won decisively. And, and they won decisively. And And I think he was counting on the fact that the opposing camp was sort of defeated, deflated, wouldn't put up much of a fight. And so really in a kind of cocky move, a week after the swearing in, his justice minister goes on the airwaves

and makes what is really a kind of monotonous speech. And you're right. He speaks in the language of judicial reform. And this is something that our voters expect, you know, as if this is kind of no big deal. And we expect to pass this very soon. But what he in fact proposes would in effect get rid of any checks and balance in the country. The executive branch in Israel is already very much in control. And what this reform, but really overhaul, proposes, is to limit and weaken the Supreme Court

and make the government basically be able to do whatever it wants. The big fight now is over judicial appointments. So what the Justice Minister and Netanyahu propose is making the government, the coalition, have, you know, they can veto and they can appoint judges themselves. And that would make the Supreme Court beholden to the government. So how did this fight begin? What are its origins? Are they demographic? Are they religious?

Are they political? They are all. The new element, I think, is the strong fusion of religion and nationalism. There was a time of separation, at least between the two. And nationalism, Zionism, was predominantly a secular movement. What takes place now is this explosive fusion of nationalism and religion. And this has all the layers that you ask. It's politics. It's everything. The main element that religion adds is that religion makes now a bid on the public space,

how we should behave in the public space. The religious element was there all the time, but the current government is utterly dependent on the votes of the religious and the ultra-religious. And the ultra-Orodoxy that was for many years anti-Zionist became nationalist, even jingoist. And that's a new thing, yes. Avishai, it seems to me on a demographic level, that the communities that are increasingly conservative, increasingly nationalist, are communities that have more children and who stay in Israel, and that the community that could be roughly

described as Tel Aviv and the like, are more fluid, and whose children are fewer, and are more likely to pick up sticks and go move to New York or Paris or London or wherever. and that the future, you know, it may be that Netanyahu compromises, the demonstrators win some level of victory, we don't know yet, but in the long run, as it were, the Jerusalem Israel triumphs over the Tel Aviv Israel,

or is that absolutely wrong? The division is class and ethnic and cultural. And there is a rift on all the, those levels. But you may even say that the difference is between the globalizable Israel and the un-globalizable Israel, those who are plugged into the global world and the global economy on those who are left behind. What makes the current rift and clash so vehement, is the overlap between the ethnic element and the class element and the class resentment towards the veterans of Israel, who mainly belongs to the upper crest

and has a different ethnic description, namely Ashkenazi description. Jews of European origins as opposed to Mizrahim, who are from Arab-speaking countries. Ruth, you've been reporting so magnificently for the New Yorker about these demonstrations, about this politics, about the composition of the government. When you're on the street, when you're in demonstrations, both in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem and elsewhere, who is there? Who are the types of people? And who is not there? And what does that say about the conflict? This is the 13th week in which the demonstrations have been going on.

And I think during the first week, people came out to the streets, and this was mostly at first in Tel Aviv, mostly, huge numbers, taking everyone by surprise, you know, not only Netanyahu, but I think the protesters themselves. I was there, and there was a sense of, wow, you know, all these people showed up. But still, at first, the demographics were sort of what you would expect. So mostly young people, mostly secular. There was a contingency of people, sort of anti-occupation activists holding the Palestinian flags. And the ranks, on the one hand, they grew. So they included many more kipa wearing Israelis, older people, families, elderly. In terms of ethnic society, it was really across.

us all, you know, Ashkenazi, Mizrahim, everyone, not only in Tel Aviv, but, you know, in Jerusalem, Be'er Sheva, up north, down south. Suddenly there were even protests in Jewish settlements like Afratt, you know, this was unheard of. Civic society protesting against what is a very right-wing government. On the other hand, you suddenly see less of this contingency of anti-occupation activists holding the Palestinian flags. And in part, this is sort of, of orchestrated. The leaders of the protest movement really kind of discourage these activists from holding the Palestinian flags because the idea is that they want to make it appeal to, you know, average Israelis and to have the kind of the widest common denominator, basically.

And the widest common denominator right now is democracy. Avishaya first started visiting you long ago when I was in Israel to do a profile of Bibi Netanyahu, when he first became prime minister, and I wonder how you think Bibi Netanyahu has evolved politically and ideologically since the 90s? He emerged as a formidable politician, but his aspirations are to be a great statesman,

trying to imitate a great man, but with all his shortcoming, he's failing and inadequate. But you asked about his involvement and I think he was very surprised that he won his first candidacy and became a prime minister, a young inexperienced prime minister.

But he became skillful later on in managing different factions, always keeping a faction on the left and a faction on the right. It's the first time, and that's the main change, that he is pushed to be in the extreme right, and no one is to the right of him, probably Jingis Khan. So the issue is that he lost his capability to maneuver. And therefore, lots of his movements that strike as irrational, a great deal of it should be attributed to the fact that in this kind of government,

what they call the full right government, he basically has no room to maneuver and can be blackmailed any time. And the question about Bibi is Bibi Netanyahu before he was indicted and Bibi after. Before he actually even was a defender or at least he put up with the Supreme Court and even was friendly with some of the people in the Supreme Court.

After he was indicted, he behaved in a Trump-like way, namely to break the legal framework of Israel so that he will be saved. Once he controlled the judiciary, namely nominating the judges, then he's in total control. So he paved his way towards Hungary and Poland, the kind of illiberal democracies in these two countries.

Which brings me to this point. Ruth, is this just a question of Bibi Netanyahu trying to save his own backside? Do we have a national crisis in Israel because a politician doesn't want to be prosecuted and possibly convicted on corruption charges. I think two things are true. On the one hand, the kind of creep to a more populous side

has been going on with Netanyahu since before his indictment. He has kind of veered from the old school Likud leaders who had this kind of veneration for the courts, basically since, let's say, in the last decade or decade and a half, right, since his second rule. But the other thing that's true is that since his indictment for the last three years, I do think we now have a country that is really going through all this upheaval because of one man's trial. And the reason I think that is because Netanyahu himself said repeatedly that he will not push for this reform when this had been proposed to him in the past.

You know, there was a kind of red line with the Supreme Court. There was a sense that he wasn't going to to pass that. And the other element of this is all the other appointments, right? So this extreme far-right minister, who I wrote about for your magazine, Itamar Ben-Givir, he said, Netanyahu said that he would never make him a minister, and he has. And this is in part because he needed a government that was really beholden to him that was tight, elements that wouldn't drop out, that he could count on as loyalists.

in order to change the judicial system in a way that would seem to favor his trial. Your dad just mentioned Hungary and Poland and comparing it to what's happening in Israel. You also wrote about this in your New Yorker profile, Vitmar Ben-Gvier. What are the exact comparisons between, say, Hungary and what's happening in Israel now? It seems to be this kind of theoretical point that people bring up Hungary and Poland. you know, kind of a sort of background to what's happening here. In fact, you know, there are these kind of webinars that are now proposed to anyone who's interested in which you have leaders of protest movements in Hungary, in Poland, in other countries,

giving out pointers as to what can happen here, what we should expect to see, and a lot of it has to do with the freeze. So Netanyahu now last week announced a freeze to the legislation, right? this was after huge protests, general strike, really shutting down the country. And after that, Netanyahu said, okay, I'm suspending legislation for now. Now, you have all these leaders in Poland and Hungary, people who had protested there saying, don't be fooled by this suspension. The same thing happened in Poland.

You know, they announced a freeze to the legislation, only to then ram it through very quickly after the protests died down, which is why the protests haven't quieted. Still people showed up on the street because there's this sense that momentum is behind the protest movement. They're not being fooled by this suspension and they're going to keep protesting. I'm speaking with Ruth Margulit and Avishai Margulet

about the judicial overhaul proposed by Bibi Netanyahu and its impact on Israel. This is the New Yorker Radio Hour with more to come. This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Rem. We're looking today at the situation in Israel. The Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has proposed what he calls a judicial reform, but it's a very clear attempt to make Israel's high court subservient to the legislature.

And that's a move from the playbook of an autocrat. It fundamentally upsets the checks and balances in the government. And in response, Israel erupted in protest, not only in the more liberal cities like Tel Aviv, but all over the country. I'll continue my conversation with Ruth Margulid, who wrote for the New Yorker about the protests, and Abyshae Margulit, Ruth's father, and a professor of philosophy, someone I've been talking to about Israeli life and politics for decades. Abishai, from the inception of the state of Israel, so much political struggle there has been

over the question of the Palestinians, a question that's even further from resolution today than it was a generation ago. Israel has very different laws within its pre-1967 borders, the so-called Green Line, than it does in the Occupy territories, the West Bank and so on. Many would say this is a debate itself about democracy, and now Israel is embroiled in quite another struggle over democracy. How would you describe that struggle? What exactly is being fought over? The issue was, can Israel have this double phase, being a democracy within the green line and running a mixture of a military occupation, colonial ruling, and even an apartheid elements of it combined. All of them are undemocratic. And the question was, what is the nature

of the body polity if you take the whole range, namely from the Jordan River, to the Mediterranean. Is it a democracy if almost third of the population are under military occupation? Many colonial countries, like the Dutch, was a democracy in Holland and a colonial power in Indonesia. Here, the problem is far more difficult because of the contiguity between Israel of the Green Line and the West Bank and Gaza. But the issue now is about democracy within the Green Line. That's the new element. Avishai, among the many distinguishing things in your background is that you are extremely important in the development of a group called. peace now, which of course had to do with the Palestinian question from the left. And I think

many people who don't keep up with Israeli politics are constantly asking me, you know, well, what about the Labor Party, which dominated the scene for so long, or what about merits, which is a left-wing party and so on and so forth? But if you follow Israeli politics, you would have to say that the left and the center left, at least as a matter of organized party politics, has been a disaster for quite a long time. Why is that the case? Why is the Labor Party so inconsequential? Well, first, it's a general phenomenon. There is an erosion of social democratic movements and parties all over. In Israel, a great deal of strengths that was in the hands of the of Mapati, namely of the Labour Party, was institutional. They were the founders of Israel and controlled many

institutions and formed many institutions. Once Israel was formed, the labor movement were stripped of its institution and they became nationalized. Once they were nationalized, like the medical insurance system and so on, labor lost its grip. And it dwindled. And another element is the sons and daughters of those founders and so on became more and more bourgeois. And there was a change even in style of life. The fact that labor lost its grip is a sorrow and a painful thing for me to admit, but I think it happened, and populist movements all over the world won over the labor movements. Does the Palestinian question just keep receding and receding to the political horizon? I just, one gets the sense that a large part of

the country either pretends it doesn't exist or when there are. emergencies when there's violence, it is in fact an emergency and then you move past it. This seems to me, and has always seemed to me, an absolutely untenable position, Ruth. I think it is untenable. And that's the big unknown about the nature of this movement. Will it be able to then kind of branch out and include not only within Israel proper, but about, you know, larger questions having to do with the West Bank, with Gaza, How long can Gaza be under siege? Let's say that the fight over democracy is won.

What happens then? Can we branch out this fight over democracy? Can it include the West Bank and then bring an end to the occupation? That is such a long way away. But there is this idea that the center-left camp has been battered for so long that they didn't even try anymore, right? The feeling was so defeatist. And so now if there is this element of defiance and kind of not only defiance, but actually thinking that there are values that are worth fighting for, not only in opposition to, but actually in favor of, then this could be a value that's being fought over, you know, equality and the end to the occupation, bringing liberties to the Palestinian people finally. Do you see any signs that these demonstrations, that this battle will somehow change Israeli politics,

that a kind of center-left movement will coalesce around it, or is this just an episode in which probably the center-left is going to lose? And that nothing will come of it. I think there is a sign of optimism. There is this potential for a kind of political realignment in the country, where the big divide is not necessarily. just a left-wing, right-wing divide over the occupation and over the Palestinian question. But with this question of democracy and liberal democracy, and you would have one side there

that represents sort of liberties and equality and everything that stands for, and secularism, too. And another side, this sort of illiberal camp, the traditionalists, the messianic in some senses, is after years of a kind of ascendant right wing in Israel, trends aren't looking promising. But this could be a sign for hope for the protest movement and everything that's happening here, this kind of civic awakening. What role does the United States play, Ruth? And we saw a back and forth between Joe Biden and Bibi Netanyahu very recently,

in which the, forget about what they said officially, but clearly what was said was the following. Joe Biden was telling Bibi Netanyahu, mind where you're going because you're taking your country to an undemocratic place and you can't expect us to endorse this, meaning the United States. And on the other side, you had Netanyahu saying, back off, buddy. So this has been going on for quite some time, this alignment of Netanyahu with the Republican Party,

with evangelical forces, at the expense of American Jewry, American Jews at large, progressives, conservative, anyone who's not orthodox, he's sort of turned away from them and also turning away from the Democratic Party and this kind of longstanding tradition of Israel being bipartisan that is no longer the case and hasn't been the case for a long time. And of course there was this kind of well-advertised bond between Tanyaahu and Trump. Trump that served both sides very well. And now with Biden, I think I was surprised both by Biden's honesty and kind of cutting out the bullshit, you know, after years of sort of whitewashing and saying, oh, we'll invite

Netanyahu to the White House and all of this will happen in due time and kind of the usual platitudes that signify a rift. Suddenly there were no platitudes. He just sort of called it out. And I was also surprised by Netanyahu, not only himself, but he was. but just his cabinet ministers, this idea that we don't need the United States. And of course, Israel's entire military depends on the United States backing. And so this idea that the ministers say, you know, oh, Biden, you should, you know, back off from our business.

With everything that's been going on, Netanyahu was always quite good about sort of uniting his ranks and telling his ministers to be quiet and to let him take care of the kind of diplomatic front. and suddenly he's not able to do that anymore. They're kind of going rogue, and he has no control over them, which just shows how he lost control generally here. Avishai, Israel is soon to be 75 years old. It's a very young country. You were born before the founding of Israel,

and you see the direction the country is going in in the ways we've discussed, demographically, politically, socially. This was founded, at least ideally, as a democratic state, if democracy fails, if finding a workable solution with the Palestinian fails, do you want to see your children remain in the state of Israel? Well, they just all return from the states and all live in Tel Aviv.

I am the only relic in Jerusalem. I remember, I think, very vividly, the time. before Israel was founded as a child, and it's changed beyond recognition. We are now standing in a juncture, and you ask me, what if it turns in the wrong direction? I don't know. I think we have a fair chance of resisting the movement. in the wrong direction. But as Yogi Berra said, when you come to a juncture, take it.

We've been talking for many years. Avishai, I've never heard you quote Yogi Berra before, but God bless you for it. Ruth, as somebody who's considerably younger, obviously, you've lived in the United States, as well as in Israel. You're back in Israel now with young children. You're seeing what's happening.

how does it affect your view of your future either in Israel or not? I should say that I have a lot of friends and acquaintances and people I know who are leaving or considering leaving the country. And to what political paradise do they go? In other words, I'm living in a country where the ex-president is under indictment and many other horrible things are happening. Is it all to the United States or where? No, it's not only to. the United States. There are some to Portugal. Some I see, you know, on Facebook, these women asking, you know, how is it, how is living in Austria these days? What is life like in Berlin? People are really kind of looking for places to go. Imagine Austria, of all places.

I know, right? In Berlin, I mean, this is really, yeah, this is quite, quite unbelievable for Israelis. This was the case, you know, a couple of months ago or right after the election. And now you're starting to see elements in the other direction. This idea that liberal Democrats are here, they're finally, their voices being heard, and it's actually worth staying and fighting. And the protests are heartening in that sense for these people who are saying,

you know, we might as well just stay and fight. And I do have some friends who were thinking of leaving and suddenly are saying, well, let's just see how this plays out and they suddenly feel that they have a role. And as for me, I always knew that I would have a role. always knew that I would move back to Israel to be with family. This is my home. And there's no question in my mind that this is where I should be. This is where I want to be. And it's not only a kind of ideological or professional, you know, journalistic stance. Life here, there is a sense of

community, of friendship, of family, of, you know, good weather, nice places to go. You've been here many times. You know this. I mean, the Israel we all love is still. here and there's a sense for people that I think that it's worth fighting for. Ruth Margulit, Avishai Margulit, thank you so much. Hag Sama'i, a good Pesach to you and to your family. Thank you, David. Good Pesach to you and to yours, David. Thank you both.

It's wonderful to talk to you. Ruth Margalite is a journalist and you can read her work at New Yorker.com and in many other publications. Avishai Marguerite is a professor emeritus in philosophy at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Thanks for listening today. Hope you'll join us next time. The New Yorker Radio Hour is a co-production

of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker. Our theme music was composed and performed by Merrill Garbess of Tune Arts with additional music by Louis Mitchell. This episode was produced by Max Walton, Breda Green, Adam Howard, Kalalia, Avery Keatley, David Krasnow, Jeffrey Masters,

Louis Mitchell, and Gophen and Putabuele, with guidance from Emily Boutin and assistance from Harrison Keyfine, Michael May, David Gable, and Meher Batia. The New Yorker Radio Hour is supported in part by the Cherina Endowment Fund.