Tens of thousands of Israelis, including former Prime Minister Yair Lapid, demonstrated Saturday night in Tel Aviv against the policies of the ruling coalition, fearing that they will lead to an anti-democratic drift, Reuters and AFP reported, cited by news.ro. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the protests, now in their third week, are a refusal by left-wing opponents to recognize the results of last November’s election.

According to Israeli media estimates, about 100,000 protesters gathered in the center of Tel Aviv and filled the streets with blue and white flags.

Police did not immediately provide an estimate of the participants, but in any case the protest was larger than last week.

Saturday’s large-scale rally followed student protests across the country and a demonstration by hundreds of lawyers outside a Tel Aviv court.

Last month, Benjamin Netanyahu returned to the post of prime minister, leading a government that brings together right-wing, far-right and ultra-Orthodox Jewish parties in the most right-wing executive in the country’s history.

“People who love the state have come to defend its democracy, its courts, the idea of ​​common life and the common good,” wrote former Prime Minister Yair Lapid on Twitter. “We will not give up until we win,” he promised.

Dissatisfied with judicial reform

The protestors’ discontent is primarily caused by the judicial reform plans of the new government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, which, according to the protesters, will threaten the democratic balance and distribution of power.

The government says the proposed reforms are necessary to curb the excesses of militant judges, but they have sparked fierce opposition from some groups, including lawyers, which has raised concerns among business leaders and deepened political divisions in Israeli society.

“They want to turn us into a dictatorship, they want to destroy democracy,” said the head of the Israel Lawyers Association, Avi Chimi. “They want to destroy the judiciary, there is no democratic country without the judiciary,” he said. says

Prime Minister Netanyahu, who has been personally prosecuted on corruption charges, has rejected the allegations and says the protests, now in their third week, are a refusal by left-wing opponents to recognize the results of the last November election.

But protesters say the future of Israeli democracy is at risk if the government succeeds in imposing plans that would increase political control over judicial appointments and limit the Supreme Court’s power to overturn government decisions or Knesset laws.

As well as threatening the independence of judges and weakening government and parliamentary oversight, they say the plans undermine minority rights and promote corruption.

Netanyahu appointed a minister convicted of fraud

But politicians from Likud, Netanyahu’s party, have long accused the Supreme Court of being dominated by left-wing judges who, they say, are politically encroaching on areas where they have no authority. Defenders of the court say it plays a vital role in holding government accountable in a country that does not formally have a constitution.

The Supreme Court, Israel’s highest court, on Wednesday overturned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s appointment of Interior Minister Aryeh Deri after he was convicted of tax fraud.

The government’s socially conservative agenda has also raised concerns among the LGBT community, and Saturday’s demonstration in Tel Aviv also attracted opponents of Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory, with many ministers strongly advocating the expansion of settlements in the West Bank.