Amid judicial overhaul, Benny Begin says nothing left of his father’s Likud
Son of ex-PM Menachem Begin laments party’s path; senior Likud members said concerned Netanyahu may agree to compromise over judicial reforms, vow to split from party if he does
Benny Begin, son of the Likud party’s iconic founder and former prime minister Menachem Begin, said Tuesday there was nothing left of his father’s vision in the current party.
Begin, who will turn 80 next month, took part in the mass protest on Monday outside the Knesset against the Likud-led coalition’s plans to radically overhaul the country’s judicial system.
“Nothing remains in Likud of the path of the Herut movement I joined 50 years ago,” Begin told Army Radio referring to the Likud predecessor. “This is bad.”
Begin attended the rally with his son and grandson.
Begin, who retired from politics last year, had already quit Likud and jumped to the breakaway New Hope party, which is now a part of National Unity led by Benny Gantz.
Starting in 1988, Begin served in the Knesset and as a minister for a total of 18 years over several periods. Until 2019 he’d done so as a member of Likud, but in 2019 he announced that he would no longer back the party, citing its inflammatory rhetoric and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s alleged criminal actions. Ahead of the 2021 election he joined New Hope, which was largely composed of former Likud members who had lost faith in Netanyahu.
את התמונה הזאת העלה אבינדב בגין, בנו של בני בגין עם הכיתוב:
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דמוקרטיה! pic.twitter.com/0MjorUt0WQ— Naomi Alon (@naomilster) February 13, 2023
(In a book in 1952, a quarter-century before he first led Likud to power, Menachem Begin wrote, regarding the checks and balances between the political majority and the independent High Court: Why should “five, seven or eleven non-elected people be able to cancel… a law passed by the representatives of the electorate?” Because, continued Begin, a lawyer by training (University of Warsaw, 1935), a parliamentary majority can be “utilized by a group of leaders as a cover for their tyranny.” Therefore, the people must “entrench its rights… so that they cannot be denied even by a parliamentary majority. This is achievable only via ‘judicial supremacy.’”)
Meanwhile, Army Radio also reported that senior Likud MKs and ministers were concerned that Netanyahu could cave to widespread public pressure and compromise on the plan to remake the judiciary.
Quoting unnamed lawmakers and “very senior ministers,” the report said there were mounting concerns over Netanyahu’s silence in the face of a call by President Isaac Herzog to hold talks and compromise over the reforms.
On Monday, Hebrew media outlets reported that Netanyahu’s lawyers had approached Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara to ask her for permission to publicly address the judicial overhaul plan. But the reports said the request was rebuffed after several hours of discussion.
Netanyahu is bound by a conflict of interest agreement that the attorney general has said bars him from dealing in any way with the legal shakeup, since elements of it could directly impact the ongoing corruption trial against him.
However, elements in Likud fear that Netanyahu’s silence could indicate that he is considering a compromise. Army Radio reported quoting them as warning the prime minister that if he “does a Netanyahu and breaks left after talking right, he won’t have a coalition or a faction.”
Citing conversations between the Likud MKs and ministers, the Army Radio report said that they were threatening to break away if he did not push through the sweeping reforms.
They also warned that other coalition partners would also bolt if he did so.
Efforts to hold talks appeared to be at an impasse.
Justice Minister Yariv Levin and Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee chairman MK Simcha Rothman said they were willing to meet without preconditions, but did not agree to the president’s call to pause their legislative efforts while talks were held.
Opposition leaders rejected this proposal, saying it was disingenuous to propose talks while moving full steam ahead with a process they see as ruinous to Israel’s democratic character.
The exchange came after legislation that would give the government an automatic majority on the Judicial Selection Committee and render quasi-constitutional Basic Laws immune from judicial oversight was approved by the Knesset committee for its first reading in the Knesset plenum, likely to be held next Monday.
The Times of Israel Community.