Reforming Israel’s Supreme Court may be the central struggle of Israel’s next government.

Israel’s next government appears set to make far-reaching reforms to Israel’s judicial system, with significant changes being planned for Israel’s Supreme Court. Israel’s political right has criticized the court in recent years for over-reaching, taking powers normally reserved to the other branches of government.

Members of the United Right, a coalition of parties that ran as one list in the recent Knesset elections, put together a document containing 16 proposals for reining in what they see as a runaway Supreme Court under the title “Sovereignty & Justice,” Israel Hayom reports on Monday.

MK Bezalel Smotrich, head of the National Union party, a member of the United Right, met several times with Likud MK Yariv Levin, considered a front-runner for the position of justice minister, to discuss the matter, the paper reports.

It is conjectured that all the suggestions will be passed and perhaps still others not included in the document, Israel Hayom says.

16 proposals

Perhaps the most significant of the 16 proposals is the passing of an “Override Clause.” It would grant the Knesset the power to reverse Supreme Court rulings with a simple majority of 61 votes. Israel’s Supreme Court has been overturning laws passed by Israel’s parliament at an increasing rate in recent years. Those in favor of the law argue that by doing so the high court has essentially usurped power belonging to the legislative branch.

Other proposals include changing the way judges are selected. The Supreme Court’s detractors argue that it’s largely self-selecting in the current setup. A nine-member committee selects judges but the court is more or less guaranteed six of the votes, giving it veto power. Those who call for change say the court naturally chooses like-minded people, preventing the court from representing the diversity of opinion that properly reflects Israeli society.

Another of the suggestions is to change the rules regarding legal standing. Currently, anyone can bring a case before the court whether or not they are an injured party, something that was not always the case in Israel but occurred in the 1980s. The situation is unlike in the U.S., for example, which requires “concrete” injury for standing.

Israel Hayom reports that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is familiar with the contents of the document but has not yet given it the “green light.”

It appears the prime minister agrees with at least some of them, tweeting on Monday:

“My policy has always been to maintain a strong and independent court — but this does not mean a court that is omnipotent. The media has published purposeful leaks and distorted interpretations that include incorrect proposals. All this is done to sow fear and prevent any changes, with the aim of stopping the necessary balancing between the Israeli branches…”

Opposition reacts

The reports of reforming the Supreme Court coupled with Prime Minister Netanyahu’s tweet led to an uproar among Israel’s opposition members and in parts of Israel’s media.

Most focused on talk of an “Immunity Law” that would protect Israeli parliamentarians from prosecution. Opponents say the prime minister wants the law to protect his own skin as he faces three corruption cases that could lead to an indictment pending a hearing.

Benny Gantz, head of the opposition as leader of the Blue & White party, tweeted on Monday, “We anticipated that Bibi would do everything in his power to build a coalition [that would act as] a legal stronghold, but such contempt for the rule of law is crossing a red line that we will not pass by in silence.”   (World Israel News)

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The U.S. does not refuse visas based solely on people’s political views or statements, a State Department official said.

A senior Palestinian official said the United States denied her application for a visa to travel to the U.S. on Monday in what appears to be the latest sign of escalating American political pressure on Palestinians.

Hanan Ashrawi, a top official in the Palestine Liberation Organization and outspoken activist for Palestinian rights, told The Associated Press that she believed she was rejected for political reasons.

She said she had been invited to a series of speaking engagements at universities and think tanks in the U.S., and was also planning to visit relatives, including a daughter and grandchildren living there.

Educated in the U.S., Ashrawi, 72, said she has visited America many times and typically makes several visits a year. With her fluent English, she is a prominent Palestinian spokeswoman on TV and has met with top U.S. officials over the past three decades.

Asked whether her visa denial was political, she said: “Of course,” calling it “pettiness and vindictiveness.”

A State Department official declined to provide details about Ashrawi’s case, citing confidentiality requirements, but said the U.S. does not refuse visas based solely on people’s political views or statements.

The Palestinian Authority severed ties with the Trump administration after it recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and moved the embassy there.

Ashrawi has accused the Trump administration of racism, among other controversial statements slandering Israel and the U.S.

Last year, when John Bolton was named U.S. national security adviser, Ashrawi said that “with his appointment…the American administration has joined the extremist Zionists, the fundamentalist Christians and the racist white people,” as reported by the PA official daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida.

In January, commenting on the as-yet-unreleased U.S. peace plan, Ashrawi said the American administration “has zero credibility.”

US Envoy to Ashrawi: ‘Let’s Not Pretend’

“Let’s be honest,” tweeted U.S. President Donald Trump’s top envoy to the Middle East, Jason Greenblatt, “[and] not pretend recent U.S. decisions are the cause of the current situation [between Israel and the Palestinians] which has existed for decades.”

Greenblatt responded to Ashrawi further on social media, saying, “You may dislike our policies & decisions, but to say we have ‘zero credibility’ is simply not factual. [Trump] has kept his commitments, such as recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and moving our Embassy to Jerusalem.”

He continued, “Which do you think gives someone credibility — working to try to achieve peace or merely making political statements, which leads to nothing? You’re entitled to criticize our policies. But let’s not ignore the huge disservice being done to the Palestinians by refusing to engage.

            (United With Israel)

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Israel has selected a location for a community to be named after President Trump on the Golan.

Israel has already identified a location on the Golan Heights to build the new town that will be named after President Donald Trump. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made the announcement at the start the government’s weekly Sunday Cabinet meeting.

On April 23, Mr. Netanyahu revealed his plan to name a new community after the U.S. president while touring the Golan Heights with his family. The gesture is meant to be in gratitude for President Trump’s official recognition of Israeli control over the area captured in the 1967 Six Day War.

Mr. Netanyahu said in a video post during his visit that there’s “a need to express our appreciation by calling a community or neighborhood on the Golan Heights after Donald Trump. I will bring that to the government [for approval] soon.”

The exact name of the community has not yet been revealed but the prime minister said it would be soon.

The future town is not the only place that will bear President Trump’s name. The mayor of Petah Tikvah recently announced he would name a town square after Mr. Trump. More such names are likely to follow.

On March 25, President Trump signed a proclamation recognizing Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights.

With Prime Minister Netanyahu present, the president said it was time for the U.S. to take the step after 52 years of Israeli control of the strategic highlands on the border with Syria.

“This should have been done numerous presidents ago,” President Trump said.

The international community has refused to recognize Israel’s sovereignty over the territory. During the war, Syria and three other Arab nations attacked the Jewish state.

President Trump’s move was met with condemnation by most of the international community, including in Europe and most Arab countries.

Envoys from Britain, France and Germany protested, saying it would legitimize Russia’s takeover of the Crimea.

U.S. diplomats reportedly responded: “In the case of the Golan Heights, Israel took over the area after a war that was forced on it. In the case of Crimea, the Russians weren’t attacked but rather invaded the area on their own initiative.”

             (World Israel News)

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Fifty-two years since the victory of the Six-Day War, the time has come to apply sovereignty over all of the Land of Israel, states Moskowitz Prize for Zionism winner Nadia Matar.

Nadia Matar and Yehudit Katzover, co-directors of the Sovereignty Movement, are two of the winners of this year’s Moskowitz Prize for Zionism.

The prize is “a bigger honor than the Nobel Prize,” Matar told Josh Hasten of Israel Uncensored in an interview Sunday. “Everything they [the Moskowitz family] do is the love and the development of the Land of Israel.”

The late Dr. Irving Moskowitz “was a prophet when he said we have to resettle Jews in eastern Jerusalem. He also acted upon his beliefs, and thanks to him and the entire Moskowitz family,” now so many Jews live there as well as in Judea and Samaria, Matar says.

The non-profit Women in Green grassroots organization – founded in 1993, headed by Matar and Katzover, and “dedicated to safeguarding our God-given biblical homeland,” as explained on its website – established the Israel Sovereignty Movement.

“What is our dream?” Matar explains in the interview. “Not only to live in the entire Land of Israel, but also to be sovereign.

“The government didn’t really know what to do” after the 1967 Six-Day War, when Israel, threatened with annihilation by the surrounding Arab countries, captured eastern Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, the Golan Heights and Sinai desert in a war of defense.

“When you win a war and return to the God-given Land of Israel…they should have applied sovereignty from a legal point of view,” Matar states.

Instead, “the government stayed for 52 years with the same ‘stuttering’ about what is the status of Judea and Samaria.”

It’s no wonder the world says that perhaps Israel is the “occupier” and the Arabs may have a legitimate case, she adds.

‘The national right has a plan’

“The national right has a plan,” Matar declares, citing her movement’s progress over recent years. “Originally it was considered a fringe idea to raise the flag of sovereignty,” but on January 31, 2017, the Central Committee of the Likud voted in favor of sovereignty over the Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria.

Considering Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s pre-election vow to annex areas of Judea and Samaria, Hasten asked Matar if she was optimistic that it will indeed be a top priority of the new government.

“We were certainly very pleasantly surprised,” Matar replied, stressing that the Israeli leader “understands that this is the wish of the majority” of Jewish voters, calling it “incredible advancement.”

“But there is talk and promises before elections and then there is implementation,” she said. “We have to make sure he will do what he promised.”

‘Immoral’ Palestinian state

Regarding the upcoming U.S. peace plan, it must be made clear that there can be no Palestinian autonomy in Judea and Samaria, Matar affirmed, saying the creation of a Palestinian state would be a “tragedy” and “unacceptable” as well as against American interests.

Such a decision would be “immoral” and increase the suffering of peace-loving Jews and Arabs, she said, noting the increased security challenges, such as missiles and rockets, that result when Israel retreats.

“We have Arabs who are with us,” she said, “cursing the Oslo agreements, cursing that the Palestinian Authority was created.

The Moskowitz Prize will be awarded on June 4 at a gala ceremony at the Jerusalem International Convention Center. Matar and Katzover plan to use the prize money to make a sovereignty conference for youth, noting that the next generation is the future.

(World Israel News)

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A delegation of US mayors is visiting Israel for a week-long educational seminar to experience a personal encounter with Israel and how it works, and to take some ideas back home.

Organized by AJC Project Interchange, the seminar is designed to further enhance US-Israel relations at the municipal level. This delegation is chaired by Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti.

This is the third such delegation to visit the Jewish state, and the first to visit under the auspices of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the US Conference of Mayors and American Jewish Committee (AJC) signed in January, the highlight of which is an annual mayors’ delegation to Israel.

The seminar is intended to provide the mayors with “a first-hand understanding of Israel, dubbed the ‘Innovation Nation’ for its economic and social entrepreneurship,” the AJC stated. “The mayors will learn about Israel’s vibrant democracy, diverse society, and regional challenges.”

They will meet with figures across the political and social spectrum, including President Reuven Rivlin, US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman, high-ranking government officials, leaders of Israel’s minority communities, and Jewish and Arab civil society leaders.

The mayors will also meet with their Israeli counterparts to discuss best practices for their home communities on smart city development, economic growth and technology start-ups, urban revitalization, and city administration.

“Los Angeles and Israel share so much – vibrant cultures, beautiful landscapes, diverse communities, ties of family and friends, our experiences as dreamers, and our common belief in democracy,” said Mayor Garcetti.

Melanie Maron Pell, AJC Managing Director of Regional Offices, who is accompanying the delegation, said that “the mayors will learn a great deal about hi-tech and economic development, immigration absorption, diversity, and emergency services that will assist them in their governance of their respective cities.”

The delegation will visit significant historical and cultural sites, as well as Tel Aviv, Haifa, Israel’s borders, and Jerusalem, including the Old City.

In January of 2018 it was reported that Israeli high-tech start-up companies raised a record $5.24 billion in 2017, an increase of nine percent on the previous year, according to the latest IVC Research Center-ZAG report.

The sum was raised in just 620 deals, compared to a total of $4.83 billion raised in 673 deals in 2016 as venture capital investments grew for the fifth consecutive year.

Four large deals of over $100 million each accounted 12 percent of the total amount raised (Cybereason, Via, Lemonade and Skybox) with an average of $8.5 million per deal in 2017, compared to just $3.6 million in 2013.

(TPS)

Israeli border police arrested a suspect in the deaths of griffon vultures on the Golan.

Israeli media extensively covered the mysterious deaths by poison of eight griffon vultures on the Golan Heights. On Monday, Israeli Border Police announced they had detained a suspect, a man in his 30s from the Bedouin village of Tuba-Zangariyye in the Galilee.

It was on Friday that the Israel Nature and Parks Authority and the Israeli Border Police were called to the scene of the crime.

It appears that the suspect poisoned a cow carcass to protect his cattle. Such indiscriminate methods have been used before to the detriment of Israel’s vulture population, which isn’t the intended target, but rather wolves and jackals.

Israel’s Kan news reports that 20 years ago there were 378 vultures in Israel. This past year the number stood at 47, a 61 percent decrease.

The poisoning sharply depletes the current vulture population on the Golan, which Israel’s Nature and Parks Authority has invested efforts in reviving. After the deaths of the eight, there remain only 13 on the Golan.

As the deaths occurred during the nesting period, the parks authority is concerned that eggs may also be lost.

In the wake of the poisonings, there have been fresh calls for increasing fines for poisoning wildlife and new legislation to deal with perpetrators.

Maariv reports that Knesset Member Miki Haimovitz of the Blue and White party, known for her animal rights advocacy, will present the “Eagles Law” on Monday aimed at protecting wildlife from similar poisonings.

“Eagles and wild animals are a significant Israeli natural resource,” MK Haimovitz said.

“The bill seeks to prohibit the use of poison and pesticides in circumstances where there is a risk of harming protected wild animals, because poisoning in open areas is the main cause of harm to the wildlife population,” she said, according to Maariv.

Similarly, the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel wants tougher punishment for killing protected wildlife.

“The world is dealing with this phenomenon, but with us the fines are ridiculous and the government protects the farmers, not the wild animals,” said Dan Alon to Maariv. He is director of the bird watching center at the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel.

A ninth vulture that was poisoned is recovering.

             (World Israel News)

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