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Caution prevailed in Israel Tuesday after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to pause controversial judicial reforms which sparked a general strike and mass protests, with the crisis far from over.
Netanyahu bowed to pressure in the face of a nationwide walkout Monday which hit hospitals, flights and more, while tens of thousands of reform opponents rallied outside parliament in Jerusalem.
“Out of a will to prevent a rupture among our people, I have decided to pause the second and third readings of the bill” to allow time for dialogue, the prime minister said in a broadcast.
The decision to halt the legislative process marked a dramatic u-turn for the premier, who just a day earlier announced he was sacking his defence minister who had called for the very same step.
The move was greeted with scepticism in Israel, with leading daily newspaper Yediot Aharonot commenting the premier “knew how to transform a crushing defeat with pretty words into a draw”.
“Israeli society is boiling and what he’s proposing is procedure,” wrote columnist Nahum Barnea.
Opposition leader Yair Lapid reacted warily, saying he wanted to be sure “that there is no ruse or bluff”.
“If the legislation truly and totally stops we are ready to engage in a real dialogue,” he said in a televised address on Monday.
The opposition had previously refused to negotiate over the reforms — which would hand politicians more power over the judiciary — until the legislative process was stopped.
Activists who have led nearly three months of protests against the reform package vowed to continue their rallies.
“This is another attempt of Netanyahu trying to gaslight the Israeli public in order to weaken the protest and then enact a dictatorship,” the Umbrella Movement of demonstrators said.
“We will not stop the protest until the judicial coup is…
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