Rothman’s lawyer spars with judges as key hearing enters 13th hour

High Court justices are continuing to hear arguments with the hearing on the reasonableness law nearing its 13th hour, though most TV channels have ended their stakeouts and have switched to regular programming.

Meanwhile, tempers are flaring (as much as they do in the uber-dignified court setting) as fatigue appears to set in.

After listening to several attorneys representing petitioners seeking the law’s annulment, a lawyer for MK Simcha Rothman, a main architect of the government’s overhaul legislation, gets into it with the bench, asking if the liberals consider the more conservative judges “antidemocratic, dictatorial and monarchial?”

After Justice Barak Erez accuses him of making a straw-man argument, he yells at the judges that he won’t apologize for the fact that their power is being restrained.

He also feuds with Justice Uzi Fogelman, claiming that judging reasonableness means walking in a minister’s shoes.

“I won’t listen to this again and again,” Fogelman fumes. “This isn’t walking in someone’s shoes, we’re looking into the considerations [behind the decision].”