In maiden Knesset speech, Gantz charges Netanyahu doesn’t care about rule of law

13 May 2019, 6:33 pm

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In a relatively tame maiden Knesset plenum speech, Blue and White party leader Benny Gantz says after fighting against Israel’s enemies as IDF chief, “I come today to battle against the new threat we face: a threat to the functioning of the democratic system and its legal and constitutional institutions.”

That is a reference to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s reported plans to promote a bill that would allow the government to overrule the High Court of Justice on administrative matters. If passed, the bill could safeguard the prime minister’s immunity from prosecution by permitting the annulment of any judicial decision that could rescind it.

“Every day we are losing a part of the Israel we knew, and getting farther away from the exemplary society we wanted to be,” Gantz tells the parliament members. “The number of suspicions attempted to be repressed with political agreements is evidence that the rule of law doesn’t at all interest the leader of the former government and the likely next government.

“Israel deserves more than a part-time prime minister and leadership that wants to be above the law.”