Comment by cs702 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by cs702 | Hacker News Reader

The best take I've read on the situation in Israel was written by Yuval Noah Harari, author of "Sapiens"[a], for the Financial Times[b]:

"To understand events in Israel, there is just one question to ask: what limits the power of the government? Robust democracies rely on a whole system of checks and balances. But Israel lacks a constitution, an upper house in the parliament, a federal structure or any other check on government power except one — the Supreme Court. This Monday, the Netanyahu government plans to pass the first in a series of laws that will neutralise the Supreme Court. If it succeeds, it will gain unlimited power.

Members of the Netanyahu coalition have already disclosed their intention to pass laws and pursue policies that will discriminate against Arab people, women, LGBTQ people and secular people. Once the Supreme Court is out of the way, nothing will remain to stop them. In such a situation, the government could also rig future elections, for example by banning Arab parties from participating — a step previously proposed by coalition members."

A government whose power is not limited by checks and balances is called an authoritarian government.

Sigh.

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[a] https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/d...

[b] https://www.ft.com/content/b027a525-05b1-45fc-a2c2-f131d341b...

It's a horrible take because it suggests that parliamentary sovereignty is authoritarian in nature, which is actually bonkers to hear. As expected, he mentions only what the court could do, but doesn't mention what the court has already done(starting with Barak in the 90s) in terms of shaping the country.

The reality is that Harari and secular Jews realize that over the next 50 years they are toast in democratic elections due to simple demographics. They need to figure out ways to protect things which they care about, and the Supreme Court is how they do this.

You substituted the executive with the legislative which is telling, whether you did so in good faith or not. The reality is that Israeli parliament is weak and nearly wholly controlled by the government. Harari's point is that there is no force to counterbalance the executive other than the courts. If there was the court could possibly be weakened with democracy remaining somewhat intact. But of course the goal is not to restore checks and balances but unlimited executive power.

Yes secular Israelis could very well be toast if trends continue. What exactly do you think will be the fate of the messianic elements in that scenerio? On that note, happy tisha beav.

I didn't substitute anything. The reality of the situation (which Harari forgets to mention anywhere) is that these things he is so scared of have ( or will have ) majority or supermajority support in the near future.

Talking about authoritarianism in Israel is useless as it suggests that there is something related to Russia or China or Cuba or Iran, but the reality is that the elections are pretty free, there is no rigging and it is simply people voting for programs they want.

I am sympathetic to secular Israelis(they are the economically productive element of the country) but I don't like the insinuation that liberal democracy is the only form of democracy, especially since Israel doesn't have a written constitution.

> reality is that the elections are pretty free

> but I don't like the insinuation that liberal democracy is the only form of democracy, especially since Israel doesn't have a written constitution.

I feel like these things go hand in hand. An enormous amount of historical precedent suggests concentration of power and illiberalness tends to erode election freedom, even when preceded by free elections.

Illiberal democracy is a chimera. Hungary and Poland get to play make believe while safely ensconced in the European Union which they feign to detest. Elsewhere the equation is: no separation of powers = authoritarian regime of some kind // robust separation of powers = modern democracy. Even in ancient Athens there was gradual understanding that assembly decisions require constitutional review, hence the introduction of the γραφή παρανόμων

I am a right wing secular israeli and the writing is on the wall. I was always with Bibi, but recently voted Lapid, I really don't know what to think or who to trust. Israel has changed so much in the last 20 years, whenever I go back all I can do is reminisce. I can't help but feeling that the Israel I loved is dying. It also feels like a big Americanization of the politics into two parties.

> You substituted the executive with the legislative which is telling, whether you did so in good faith or not. The reality is that Israeli parliament is weak and nearly wholly controlled by the government

Isn't that totally ordinary for parliamentary democracies? Don't they literally work by having the leader parliament wear the executive hat in addition to his legislative one?

The hard distinction between the legislative, executive, and judicial branches is (mostly) an Americanism.

> Harari's point is that there is no force to counterbalance the executive other than the courts. If there was the court could possibly be weakened with democracy remaining somewhat intact. But of course the goal is not to restore checks and balances but unlimited executive power.

It's kind of interesting to see how the liberal zeitgeist's view of "checks and balances" shifts radically based on the context. In the US, a lot of liberals have been fantasizing furiously for the past several years over parliamentary systems that lack them, because in the US the "checks" have recently been thwarting the liberal political agenda.

Honestly, I think a lot of liberals would actually prefer a "democracy" closer to Iran's system; where there are "elections," but ultimate power rests with a liberal "Guardian Council," so the outcome is liberal regardless of the election results.

> The reality is that Israeli parliament is weak and nearly wholly controlled by the government.

You have it exactly backwards: the government is selected from the MPs and is supported by the parliament. The most popular way to change a government is to call for (legislative) elections. (No executive elections — these were tried for a short period and cancelled.) The government is controlled by the parliament, not the other way around.

The government is chosen by the Knesset, and the prime minister is a member of Knesset - and usually, his entire cabinet is also made up of MKs of coalition parties. So a >50% coalition in parliament is equivalent to a government.

However, there is the 49% of parliament that constitutes the opposition. Israel used to have norms where the opposition had some balancing power. Today they have absolutely none.

There are no checks and no balances on the government/parliamentary majority except for the courts.

so you are, literally, both correct.

The legislative has never been weaker (minority) and never been more authoritarian (majority).

Glad we can all agree on something.

> Israel used to have norms where the opposition had some balancing power.

Israel is a parliamentary democracy, and the power is vested with the majority of the parliament. As it is with any other parliamentary democracy, which is the preferred system across almost all of Europe. (We can add "parliamentary constitutional monarchies" where the monarch does not have any real power to that list.)

I also don't see what "balancing power" had any opposition have in the past. The coalition (majority) tries to advance some issues while the opposition (minority) tries to torpedo them. It has always been that way, there is absolutely nothing new here.

The government being able to fire an MP from being a minister in the government is a strong deterrent against this minister from voting against the coalition.

The coalition and the government are one, in effect, mainly due to coalition discipline.

A good example of that is the recent vote for elimination of Reasonability, where all of the members of the coalition voted for it. Do you honestly believe there's no one person in the coalition who opposed it?

The only reason secular jews are losing a majority is bc the orthodox don’t work, don’t serve in the military, and just increase the size of their families. Effectively the majority leaders are growing a majority by entrenching this dynamic, creating a runaway authoritarian theocracy. Eventually the economy will erode and collapse from this as well

The question he avoids is is it possible for the supreme court to have too much power? This is exactly what the other side says is happening. Today's vote was on a concept called "reasonableness" which means that the Supreme court (mostly left-wing) can veto legislation they deem "unreasonable". This is a power US citizens are not familiar with.

If any one of the branches has too much power there is a problem. I don't know if the right-suggestions are better, but I understand what they are fighting for.

> This is a power US citizens are not familiar with.

For the US citizens: imagine that SCOTUS turns down affirmative action — not because "this Court has found affirmative action unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment's Equal Protection Clause", but because "this Court has found affirmative action highly unreasonable".

No, this is a terrible metaphor, because the 14th amendment in this example doesn't exist.

Imagine a US without a constitution, but instead it just has a big body of case law and precedent to go on. The judiciary's role is to adjudicate when that case law contradicts itself, and to decide if a given new law contradicts the rest of the case law.

The Knesset is limiting the judiciary's ability to review such things, which to an American is now analogous to Marbury v Madison being decided unconstitutional.

Amazing how, even here, the arguments made about this issue are disingenuous to outright misleading.

Israel has a body of Basic Laws, and Barak has declared that body to represent a Constitution.

The Supreme Court is doing a good job determining where a law contradicts a Basic Law, and invalidating that law because of a contradiction. E.g. Surrogacy law was returned to the legislative — not since it was "unreasonable", but because it was unequal. (The legislative fixed the law to include homosexuals, and the law passed.)

The "unreasonableness" clause is not the only tool SC has at their disposal. From now on, they can use the other tools — just not "we find this unreasonable".

> are disingenuous to outright misleading

HN Guidelines: "Assume good faith."

> just not "we find this unreasonable"

That's an over simplistic representation, which you may have done in good faith. The coalition MPs are making it very hard to assume that they spread this narrative in good faith.

The notion of Reasonability or Reasonableness is a well established legal principal [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonability

Thats essentially what they do.

There is lots of handwaving about how they are technically just interpreting the Constitution and federal law, but the U.S. Supreme Court has made political, subjective decisions for as long as the court has existed.

Now, if SCOTUS explicitly and deliberately violated the Constitution, that would be... something. But this is impossible in Israel, from what I understand.

If only Israel had a constitutional laws. In lack of the only democracy keeper is the supreme court

Israel has Basic Laws in lieu of Constitution, and Barak has declared the body of Basic Laws to be a Constitution.

UK, notably, also has no constitution — it however wouldn't be reasonable to argue that "the only democracy keeper [in the UK] is the supreme court".

> UK, notably, also has no constitution — it however wouldn't be reasonable to argue that "the only democracy keeper [in the UK] is the supreme court".

Exactly. IIRC, the UK didn't have anything called a "Supreme Court" until very recently (its highest "court" used to be a committee in the upper house of parliament), and even then it's clearly subordination to Parliament:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supreme_Court_of_the_United_Ki...:

> The United Kingdom has a doctrine of parliamentary sovereignty,[6] so the Supreme Court is much more limited in its powers of judicial review than the constitutional or supreme courts of some other countries. It cannot overturn any primary legislation [Acts of Parliament] made by Parliament. However, as with any law court in the UK, it can overturn secondary legislation [an American translation may be executive orders and agency regulations] if, for an example, that legislation is found to be ultra vires to the powers in primary legislation allowing it to be made.

Basic Law in Israel is made in the same process as regular law, so it can't be relied upon for depending the public from the regime.

The UK is a monarchy, so... In all seriousness, I don't know enough about UK law and government structure, but if I take what you said in face value, it may very well be that the UK's democracy is held by norms, and not government structure. That doesn't make it OK. It just means that they're prone to fall like other post democratic nations.

What issue specifically are the conservatives in Israel mad about? Settlements.

It's not about high political principles or abstract questions of balance of power. It's conservatives mad that the supreme court keeps finding settlements illegal.

That's it. That's all it is. That's why they care about it now, as opposed to any other time in Israel's history. The ultra Zionists are in power and they want to cement as much Jewish settlement for as long as they can.

That's what this is. It's simple.

It may be that the supreme court has too much power, but the executive branch actually has executive power, which the court does not. In the meanwhile, the parliament is held hostage by the government, by the power of coalition and party discipline. An evidence for that is the total uniformity in how they vote for the problematic bills in question.

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