Netanyahu govt declares it will ignore Israeli Supreme Court allowing media regulator to convene
WASHINGTON — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s cabinet greenlit a resolution Sunday committing to ignore the country’s supreme court order against allowing its media regulator to convene.The resolution marks the first time an Israeli government has committed to openly defying the country’s highest court, paving the way for a constitutional crisis to rock the Jewish state.“You have no power to trample the law.A ruling that contradicts the law will not be recognized, and decisions made under it are void,” the Netanyahu government declared.At issue is the supreme court’s June 17 ruling that blocked new appointments to Israel’s Second Authority for Television and Radio — an agency similar to America’s Federal Communications Commission.The high court further opted to restore the previous Second Authority for Television and Radio, despite concerns that it had dropped below the legal headcount needed to operate under its quorum.Israel’s supreme court blamed the government’s “deliberate obstruction and paralysis” for the resignations that led to the regulatory agency dipping below quorum.
It also pointed to a “puzzling proximity in time” between the various resignations on the panel.Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi and Justice Minister Yariv Levin together rolled out the formal cabinet resolution to defy the ruling, with Netanyahu’s backing.They argued that the high court overstepped its powers and deviated from the letter of the law in its ruling.“High Court judges are not the Knesset, and a fit of power does not grant authority to erase an explicit threshold condition from the law, even if it is inconvenient for them,” Karhi contended.“The rule of law is not the rule of the judges.
Today, the government has clearly stated: when the High Court tramples the law, the state will not lend a hand to it.Two-thirds is a legal requirement, not a recommendation, and a council that does not meet the threshold conditions set ...