The Democrats’ Golan: ‘Tonight, the fight begins for the democratic and Zionist soul of Israel’

The Democrats party chief Yair Golan tells the thousands of anti-government protesters gathered on Tel Aviv’s Begin Road that “we will carry out intense sabotage within the confines of the law.”

“We’ll take it up a notch,” he declares. “We’ll give the government a single choice: elections, as fast as possible, on our terms.”

He also calls on State Ombudsman for Judges Asher Kula, who was tapped by the government this week to investigate the Sde Teiman leak affair in an attempt to bypass Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara, not to take part in efforts to curb the legal system’s powers.

“History will remember who prevented the coup and who served it. The choice is yours,” says Golan.

“Tonight, the fight begins for the democratic and Zionist soul of the State of Israel, and I guarantee, the State of Israel will remain a democracy. Period,” he says.

“Horrifically, the greatest threat to our existence is an internal threat,” he says. “This government is the most pressing existential threat to the State of Israel.”

Golan announces to applause that from the rally he will head to “a meeting of the opposition heads,” referring to leaders of Zionist parties opposed to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“We’ll fight until we win,” he says. “I promise you we’ll win.”

Prominent anti-government activist Shikma Bressler, who is emceeing the demonstration, rallies the crowd in chants of “democracy.” She also accuses the government of “blood libel” against Bahrav-Miara by blaming her for the cover-up of former military attorney general Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi’s leak of surveillance video purporting to show IDF troops at the Sde Teiman detention facility severely abusing a Palestinian inmate.

“The real target of their attacks” on Tomer-Yerushalmi “is Baharav-Miara,” says Bressler.