Ben Gvir claims High Court hearing on his removal part of ‘coup’ by attorney general

National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir claims that the High Court of Justice hearing on Thursday concerning his removal from cabinet is part of an illegal “coup” led by Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara and law enforcement agencies.

The hearing is in response to a High Court filing by Baharav-Miara accusing Ben Gvir of systematically abusing his powers, and arguing that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu must be ordered to explain why he hasn’t fired him.

Speaking to the press at the Knesset ahead of his Otzma Yehudit faction meeting, Ben Gvir frames the upcoming hearing and wider dispute with the attorney general as part of “a struggle over the foundational principle of democracy.”

“A group of bureaucrats is trying to strip the Knesset, the government, and the ministers of their authority,” he says.

“This is simply a coup against democracy being carried out in complete violation of the law,” Ben Gvir adds.

He accuses Baharav-Miara without evidence of “political persecution against many coalition members, including targeted harassment of the prime minister’s associates and myself.”

The attorney general has accused the far-right minister of exercising undue influence over the police, a force meant to operate independently, and has said that he has violated a compromise the two agreed on last year. Ben Gvir has maintained that he is fulfilling the will of the voters who elected him and branded the attorney general a “criminal.”

Through a “continuous (sometimes sophisticated) system of pressure” on police officers, Ben Gvir has inappropriately intervened in the force’s operations concerning anti-government protesters, the status quo on the Temple Mount and protection for Gaza-bound aid trucks, the attorney general wrote in a 68-page opinion on petitions calling for Ben Gvir to be dismissed, which the court is expected to hear on Thursday.