Tzipi Livni to Haaretz: Next Israeli Election Will Be Referendum on the Declaration of Independence

But Livni plans to use the situation to her advantage. In one of her first moves as opposition leader, she gathered together representatives of 40 civil society organizations active in a wide range of causes and invited them to join her new “emergency coalition,” as she terms it, to fight this law, which she believes jeopardizes Israel’s democratic character. [...]

An outspoken advocate of the two-state solution, Livni has led numerous rounds of negotiations with the Palestinians on behalf of the Israeli government. Her cabinet posts have included stints as foreign minister, housing minister, immigrant absorption minister and, twice, justice minister. And in more than two decades of government service, she has moved increasingly toward the left. [...]

Livni broke with Likud in 2005 and, together with then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and future Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, helped found the centrist Kadima party. After Kadima disintegrated, she started a new party, Hatnuah, which focused on promoting peace. It joined with the Labor Party before the 2015 national election to form the Zionist Union alliance. After Isaac Herzog left the Knesset earlier this month to assume his new position as chairman of the Jewish Agency, Livni was appointed opposition leader by Avi Gabbay, Labor’s new chairman. (Although he heads the party, Gabbay does not have a seat in the Knesset and, therefore, cannot serve as opposition leader.) [...]

Livni steps into her new role at a time when Israel-Diaspora relations have also hit rock bottom: Progressive Jews – who account for the vast majority outside of Israel – have grown increasingly anxious about the direction the country is taking, both religiously and politically.

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Haaretz: Netanyahu Has a New Scapegoat for His Corruption Scandal

Only Benjamin Netanyahu could have navigated the past three days and landed on his feet, unscathed in any significant way politically and without throwing the coalition into turmoil. He chalked up an impressive success in shaping the media discourse following the calamity of the police’s recommendations after their investigations of him. His party is united in supporting him and many of his friends took part in the vilification of the political rival who turns out to be a witness in Case 1000: MK Yair Lapid, chairman of Yesh Atid. [...]

The death throes are going to be prolonged and ugly. The handwriting of Netanyahu’s end is already written on the wall. The lightning polls conducted a day after the police publicized their findings showed that Likud has not been weakened and in fact has been strengthened, but that its leader’s situation is dire and isn’t likely to improve. The majority of the public doesn’t believe him, prefers the police account and thinks the prime minister is corrupt and needs to resign. The breaking point will come when the attorney general announces his decision to indict the prime minister – if that’s what he decides. However, that is still months down the road. [...]

Throughout all his years in politics, Netanyahu has honed to an art the practice of shifting the campaign to his rival’s field. He defines himself through the agency of his foes, both in the international arena and in domestic party politics. In the run-up to the last election, for example, he portrayed Zionist Union leaders Isaac Herzog and Tzipi Livni as traitors and collaborators with the Islamic State, who were directing the militants toward Jerusalem on their pickups.

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Haaretz: Israel's High Court Strikes Down Exemption of ultra-Orthodox From Military Service

An expanded nine-justice panel of the court headed by outgoing Supreme Court President Miriam Naor ruled eight to one, with Justice Noam Sohlberg dissenting. The decisive majority of justices agreed with the position of the petitioners, the Movement for Quality Government, that the law perpetuates inequality between secular youths who are required to enlist in the army and religious youth who are exempt. [...]

The hope of meeting the enlistment targets set by existing the law are growing less and likely every year, said the court. As a result, the law’s goal of reducing inequality in the burden of military service is not being met, wrote Naor. Not only do the data not change the conclusions about the failure of the law to reduce inequality they only validate and strengthen the claims against the law, she added. [...]

MK Menachem Eliezer Moses (United Torah Judaism) said: “The High Court of Justice once again proves how cut off the it is from Jewish tradition and how deep is its hatred for anything dear to those who study Torah and the guardians of religion. The High court continues time after time to intervene scandalously in the Knesset’s decisions.  We have had enough and the time has come to return [the High Court] to its natural proportions.” [...]

Interior Minister Arye Dery, head of the ultra-Orthodox Shas party, was swift to condemn the ruling, saying it “again proves the serious disconnect between the Supreme Court and the Jewish people, who have known through all generations that what holds us together against persecution and evil decrees was Torah study.

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