Letters

Protests in Israel and the rule of law

Checks and balances

Thu Jul 27 2023 - 00:08

Sir, – Given that Binyamin Netanyahu has been the arch-proponent of settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories which the UN has declared illegal, it should come as no surprise that he has decided to neutralise the jurisdiction of the Israeli supreme court. The court itself has, over the years, made a number of decisions adjudging many of these settlements to be unlawful, the most recent being the Homesh settlement on the West Bank, on the basis that the land was privately owned by Palestinians from the nearby village of Burqa. The Israeli administration has ignored this ruling and Homesh is now effectively an Israeli army base.

As your editorial points out (“The Irish Times view on protests in Israel: the shape of the country’s democracy is at stake”, July 26th), Israel has no written constitution, which means that the decision to eliminate the power of the supreme court to overrule government decisions that are deemed unreasonable will remove the only checks and balances which exist in relation to what will now become an unfettered Israeli executive.

Mr Netanyahu has been Israel’s longest serving prime minister but his settlement policy and hardline military strategy has alienated successive US presidents, with the exception of Donald Trump. During one of his terms of office from 2009 to 2021, the UN Office for the Coordination of Human Affairs reported that from 2008 until 2020, 5,600 Palestinians had died as a result of the conflict as opposed to 250 Israeli citizens, highlighting what is clearly a disproportionate response, vigorously pursued by the Israeli government, led by Mr Netanyahu.

In supporting Israel, the West has always highlighted the importance of the country’s long-standing democratic credentials in a volatile region where many autocratic regimes continue to exist. One can only hope that the protesters and ordinary Israeli citizens will prevail and ensure that Mr Netanyahu’s final contribution to Israeli public life will not result in the destruction of the democratic principles that have stood the State of Israel in good stead since its foundation. – Yours, etc,

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MARTIN McDONALD,

Terenure,

Dublin 12.

Sir, – Your insightful editorial is a little rose-tinted in its characterisation of the Israeli judiciary as “a bulwark for minorities against a system with few other checks and balances”.

In fact, the Israeli judiciary has long been complicit in the expansion of illegal Israeli settlements, and the uprooting of indigenous Palestinian people from their homeland. Over the years, the Israeli high court of justice has rubberstamped numerous atrocities; it has approved the confiscation of the homes of Palestinian refugees in East Jerusalem, facilitated the Knesset in enacting legislation to revoke the residency of Palestinians in East Jerusalem on the nebulous charge of “breach of allegiance” to the Israel state, and even given the go-ahead for torture, or should we say, “extreme forms of physical pressure”, to be deployed against Palestinian prisoners.

Abandoned, at the mercy of Israeli aggression and expansionism, the Palestinian people are still waiting for decisive action from the world’s political leaders.

Two years ago, an Oireachtas Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defence report acknowledged Ireland’s responsibility “to not render aid or assistance to Israel which would facilitate the maintenance of an internationally wrongful act of annexation”.

By enacting the Occupied Territories Bill, which passed both Houses of the Oireachtas with cross-party support several years ago, the Irish Government could finally fulfil this legal and moral duty. – Yours, etc,

BRIAN Ó ÉIGEARTAIGH,

Donnybrook,

Dublin 4.