Several thousand Israelis demonstrated on Saturday evening in Tel Aviv against the new government led by Benjamin Netanyahu, the most right-wing in the country’s history.
“Get out”, “Together against fascism and apartheid”, “Democracy in danger”, could be read on signs brandished by demonstrators who took to the streets of the city center, noted AFP journalists.
Winner of the legislative elections of 1er November, Mr. Netanyahu, charged with corruption, took the head on December 29 of a government formed with parties of the extreme right and ultra-Orthodox, of which certain tenors were appointed to key posts.
“I came here today with thousands of people. It’s the first time but [le mouvement] going to last because we have a problem, extremists are deploying their forces when they do not represent the majority of the population,” said Omer, a protester who works in Tel Aviv in the high technology sector.
The new ministerial team has already announced its intentions, among other things, to continue colonization in the Palestinian Territories, to carry out reforms which raise concerns in the LGBT community in particular and its intentions to reform the judicial system.
Overturn Supreme Court decisions
A controversial reform, presented to the press on Wednesday, provides for the introduction of a so-called “derogation clause” which would allow Parliament, with a simple majority vote, to annul a decision of the Supreme Court.
“We don’t want to see our democracy disappear and the Supreme Court be destroyed. We want the government to be controlled,” Assaf, a lawyer, who declined to give his last name, told AFP.
In addition to the Israeli flags or the colors of the rainbow, the protesters in Tel Aviv also brought out the t-shirts and banners crossed out with the mention “Crime minister” (“Minister of crime”) in reference to the indictment of Benjamin Netanyahu for corruption in a series of cases.
This slogan had been widely taken up during an anti-Netanyahu protest movement which had seen, from 2020 and for months, Israelis meeting every week on Saturday evenings to demand the departure of the one who had already been in office. from 1996 to 1999 then from 2009 to 2021.
The Likud leader was ousted from power in June 2021 by a motley coalition set up to oust him but promised to return to business.