CNN: How a historic general strike brought Israel to a standstill

Israel’s political crisis escalated into uncharted territory as the country’s largest trade union announced a “historic” strike shutting down transportation, universities, restaurants and retailers in protest against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s planned judicial overhaul. CNN’s Hadas Gold reports. #CNN #News #israel

Transcript

A political crisis and now a potential security crisis on the streets of Israel as the country was brought to a standstill by the largest general strike in Israeli history, sparked by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to weaken the Supreme Court. And his firing of the country’s defense minister

For speaking out against the overhaul. Fiery protests erupted Sunday and grew Monday with demonstrators descending on Jerusalem from all over Israel. Chanting for democracy as they gathered in mass in front of the country’s Supreme Court. And outside Israel’s parliament, the Knesset nearby. These changes to the judiciary

In Israel will be the most significant since the country’s founding in 1948. Not before they will give the Israeli parliament, the Knesset and therefore whatever parties and politicians are in power more control over the judiciary from how and who the judges are who are to be selected

To even the ability to overturn certain Supreme Court decisions. Now, critics of these reforms fear that will destroy the independence of the Israeli judiciary. They would hurt, hurt minority rights and would also hurt human rights in Israel from everything from freedom of speech and expression to freedom of religion.

On Monday, flights were halted and Israel ports stopped work alongside universities, embassies, abroad, malls and even McDonald’s slim. If the leader of Israel’s largest union demanded the historic general strike to stop what he called this judicial revolution, this craziness it seemed to have had the intended effect. Zoom whatever we are

Out of the desire to prevent a rift in the nation, I decided to suspend the second and third reading of the law in this session of the Knesset to give time to try and reach a broad agreement. For Netanyahu, this may be more than just a political setback Critics say

The overhaul will help Netanyahu in his ongoing corruption trial, a charge he denies. In a Saturday evening interview with British journalist Piers Morgan, Netanyahu denied he was pushing for autocratic rule. To try to paint me as some Third-World autocrat is ridiculous. I believe in the balance.

I’m a classic Democrat with a small view. I don’t want to get into trouble with my American friends, but I am a classic believer in the balance between the three branches of government. That’s what ensures democracy. And it’s been thrown off balance in Israel. We have to bring it back. Before his speech

To the nation on Monday, he acknowledged the precarious situation the country is in as some right wing groups began calling for counter-protests, tweeting. I call on all the demonstrators in Jerusalem on the right and the left to behave responsibly and not to act violently. We are brotherly people with the country in chaos.

There are fears now that this divisiveness could still lead to bloodshed. And while the general strike was lifted once the suspension was announced, that was also praised by the US State Department. Opposition leaders have been a bit more circumspect taking more of a wait and see approach, whether there will actually be proper

Negotiations on a compromise reform that they want to be mediated by the Israeli president Wolf. All right, Hadas, stay with us. I also want to bring in Israeli journalist Barak Ravid, who’s covering all of this very closely. Barak. Prime Minister Netanyahu may be backing down for now, but without real debate

Could this crisis spiral even further I will. Well, I think that this is definitely not the end of this crisis. I think we’re still pretty much at the beginning because even though Netanyahu announced the suspension of the plan and the opposition said that it’s ready for a dialog. The gaps are pretty big.

And I think that it is not an unlikely scenario that several weeks will pass. It will have several rounds of negotiation, reach a deadlock, and then we will see a rerun of everything we’ve seen in the last few weeks. As you know, Israelis have been out there protesting on the streets of Israel

For months now. How did it get to this point, Barak? How concerned are Israelis about an authoritarian lurch that potentially is out there I think that obviously on Sunday night when when Netanyahu decided to fire the minister of defense, you have Garland just because he did his job and warned

That this judicial overhaul is a clear and immediate threat to Israel national security. I think this is when the penny drop, not only for the usual suspects, people that did not vote for Netanyahu. I think the penny then dropped for a lot of Likud vote And I think that

Then you saw a spontaneous rage erupt around the country, which led to again, hundreds of thousands of people in the streets. And I think that in a way, we know today that three months after this whole thing started, for Netanyahu politically, this was like hitting the self-destruct button. You saw the polls tonight

In three different Israeli television channels. All of them showed that Netanyahu is at above. 65% unfavorability. He never had those lowest numbers. Hadas, some are vowing to continue protesting on the streets of Israel. Where do you think things go from here? Well, I definitely think the protests will continue because the protesters

Now, we’ve seen them both for this reform coming out tonight, as well as the protesters who have been out for 12 weeks now against reform. They have a lot of energy. They have a lot of organization behind them. And a lot of them, I think, do not believe Netanyahu at his word

When he says he’s going to suspend the legislation. They’re going to also want to see whether there will be real negotiations over a possible compromise. Hadas Gold and Barak Ravid, guys, thank you very, very much.

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