‘Even if all the proposed reforms were enacted, they would simply align Israel with Canada, New Zealand, or Australia.’
Israel National News Mar 16, 2023,
Leading US attorney Prof. Alan Dershowitz, who has voiced his opposition to Israel’s judicial reform plan in the past, now admits that despite his opposition, the legislation would not make Israel any less democratic.
During a Zoom debate with legal scholar Eugene Kontorovich organized by J-AIR Jewish radio on the subject of the reforms, Dershowitz insisted that the majority of opposition to the reform is due to the fact that a right-wing government is proposing it. “If exactly the same proposals were being made by a centrist government, or left-wing government, no one would notice,” he claimed. “There would be no demonstrations. There would be some academic discussion, law school teachers would be teaching it, but hardly anyone would care.”
He added that in his 60 years of following such issues, he’s never heard of a demonstration genuinely about judicial reform. “It’s not about judicial reform, it’s about the fact that the reform is being put foward by a government that frightens a lot of people, a government that includes some extreme right-wing people,” the professor alleged.
Despite his opposition to most of the reforms, Dershowitz added that, “Even if all of these reforms were to be enacted, it would turn Israel, G-d forbid, into Canada, New Zealand, or Australia, or many European countries. It would not turn it into Poland, or an autocratic country.”
“There are extremes on both sides,” he continued, “and alongside a need for compromise, there really is a need for some reform … Reform will not undercut democracy,” he stressed. “In some respects, it would make Israeli more democratic.”
I am glad to see that Dershowitz seems to have mollified his former position that judicial reform would prevent him from defending Israel before the world.