Bennett blasts judges: ‘They’ve forgotten there’s a government’

Education Minister Naftali Bennett says his “central goal” for the Knesset winter session will be to advance a constitutional Basic Law allowing the Knesset to bypass the High Court of Justice.

“There are judges in Jerusalem who have forgotten that there is also a government in Jerusalem,” says Bennett at the weekly Jewish Home faction meeting.

“In recent years, the High Court has placed itself above the legislature, instead of alongside it,” he adds.

Bennett refers to recent court decisions over the summer torpedoing legislation on illegal migrants and the treasury’s third-apartment tax, calling the rate of rulings against the legislation “nearly unprecedented.”

In the Basic Law, there will be a clause blocking the courts from rejecting Knesset legislation, he says.

The Jewish Home minister also criticizes a court decision Sunday to demolish six homes in the West Bank outpost of Netiv Ha’avot, calling it “mystifying and outrageous.”

— Marissa Newman