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‘Two Israels’: What’s really behind the judicial reform protests
(JTA) — When Benjamin Netanyahu put his controversial calls for judicial reform on pause two weeks ago, many thought the protesters in Israel and abroad might declare victory and take a break. And yet a week ago Saturday some 200,000 people demonstrated in Tel Aviv, and pro-democracy protests continued among Diaspora Jews and Israeli expats, including those who gather each Sunday in New York’s Washington Square Park.
On its face, the weeks of protest have been about proposed legislation that critics said would sap power from the Israeli Supreme Court and give legislators — in this case, led by Netanyahu’s recently elected far-right coalition — unchecked and unprecedented power. Protesters said that, in the absence of an Israeli constitution establishing basic rights and norms, they were fighting for democracy. The government too says the changes are about democracy, claiming under the current system unelected judges too often overrule elected lawmakers and the will of Israel’s diverse electorate.
But the political dynamics in Israel are complex, and the proposals and the backlash are also about deeper cracks in Israeli society. Yehuda Kurtzer, president of the Shalom Hartman Institute of North America, recently said in a podcast that the crisis in Israel represents “six linked but separate stories unfolding at the same time.” Beyond the judicial reform itself, these stories include the Palestinians and the occupation, a resurgent patriotism among the center and the left, chaos within Netanyahu’s camp, a Diaspora emboldened to weigh in on the future of Zionism and the rejection on the part of the public of a reform that failed the “reasonableness test.”
“If these protests are effective in the long run, it will be, I think, because they will have succeeded at reorganizing and mobilizing the Israeli electorate to think and behave differently than before,” said Kurtzer.
I recently asked observers, here and in Israel, what they feel is really mobilizing the electorate, and what kind of Israel will emerge as a result of the showdown. The respondents included organizers of the protests, supporters of their aims and those skeptical of the protesters’ motivations. They discussed a slew of issues just below the surface of the protest, including the simmering Israeli-Palestinian conflict, divisions over the increasing strength of Israel’s haredi Orthodox sector, and a lingering divide between Ashkenazi Jews with roots in Europe and Mizrahi Jews whose ancestry is Middle Eastern and North African.
Conservatives, meanwhile, insist that Israeli “elites” — the highly educated, the tech sector, the military leadership, for starters — don’t respect the will of the majority who brought Netanyahu and his coalition partners to power.
Here are the emerging themes of weeks of protest:
Defending democracy
Whatever their long-term concerns about Israel’s future, the protests are being held under the banner of “democracy.”
For Alon-Lee Green, one of the organizers of the protests, the issues are equality and fairness. “People in Israel,” said Green, national co-director of Standing Together, a grassroots movement in Israel, “hundreds of thousands of them, are going out to the streets for months now not only because of the judicial reform, but also — and mainly — because of the fundamental question of what is the society we want to live in: Will we keep living in a society that is unequal, unfair and that is moving away from our basic needs and desires, or will it be an equal society for everyone who lives in our land?”
Shany Granot-Lubaton, who has been organizing pro-democracy rallies among Israelis living in New York City, says Netanyahu, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and the coalition’s haredi Orthodox parties “are waging a war against democracy and the freedoms of citizens.”
“They seek to exert control over the Knesset and the judicial system, appoint judges in their favor and legalize corruption,” she said. “If this legal coup is allowed to proceed, minorities will be in serious danger, and democracy itself will be threatened.”
Two researchers at the Institute for Liberty and Responsibility at Herzliya’s Reichman University, psychology student Benjamin Amram and research associate Keren L.G. Snider, said Netanyahu’s proposed judicial reform “undermines the integrity of Israel’s democracy by consolidating power.”
“How can citizens trust a government that ultimately has no limitations set upon them?” they asked in a joint email. “At a time when political trust and political representation are at the lowest points, this legislation can only create instability and call into question the intentions of the current ruling party. When one coalition holds all the power, laws and policies can be swiftly overturned, causing instability and volatility.”
A struggle between two Israels
Other commentators said the protests revealed fractures within Israeli society that long predated the conflict over judicial reform. “The split is between those that believe Israel should be a more religious country, with less democracy, and see democracy as only a system of elections and not a set of values, and those who want Israel to remain a Jewish and democratic state,” Tzipi Livni, who served in the cabinets of right-wing prime ministers Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert before tacking to the center in recent years, recently told Haaretz.
Author and translator David Hazony called this “a struggle between two Israels” — one that sees Israel’s founding vision as a European-style, rights-based democracy, and the other that sees that vision as the return of the Jews to their ancient homeland.
“Those on the first side believe that the judiciary has always been Israel’s protector of rights and therefore of democracy, against the rapaciousness and lawlessness of politicians in general and especially those on the right. Therefore an assault on its supremacy is an assault on democracy itself. They accuse the other side of being barbaric, antidemocratic and violent,” said Hazony, editor of the forthcoming anthology “Jewish Priorities.”
As for the other side, he said, they see an activist judiciary as an attempt by Ashkenazi elites to force their minority view on the majority. Supporters of the government think it is entirely unreasonable “for judges to think they can choose their successors, strike down constitutional legislation and rule according to ‘that which is reasonable in the eyes of the enlightened community in Israel,’” said Hazony, quoting Aharon Barak, the former president of the Supreme Court of Israel and bane of Israel’s right.
(Naveh Dromi, a right-wing columnist for Yediot Achronot, puts this more bluntly: “The problem,” she writes, “lies in the fact that the left has no faith in its chance to win an election, so it relies on the high court to represent it.”)
Daniel Tauber, an attorney and Likud Central Committee member, agrees that those who voted for Netanyahu and his coalition have their own concerns about a democracy — one dominated by “elites,” which in the Israeli context means old-guard Ashkenazi Jews, powerful labor unions and highly educated secular Jews. “The more this process is subject to veto by non-democratic institutions, whether it be the Court chosen as it is, elite military units, the Histadrut [labor union], or others, the more people will lose faith in democracy,” said Tauber.
Green also said there is “a war waging now between two elites in Israel” — the “old and more established liberal elite, who consist of the financial, high-tech army and industry people,” and the “new emerging elite of the settlers and the political far-right parties.”
Israelis protest against the government’s planned judicial overhaul, outside the Supreme Court in Jerusalem, March 27, 2023. (Jamal Awad/Flash90)
And yet, he said, “I think we will lose if one of these elites wins. The real victory of this historic political moment in Israel will be if we achieve true equality, both to the people who are not represented by the Jewish supremacists, such as the Palestinian citizens of Israel, and to the people who are not represented by the ‘old Israel,’ such as the haredi and Mizrahi people on the peripheries.”
The crises behind the crisis
Although the protests were ignited by Netanyahu’s calls for judicial reform, they also represented pushback against the most right-wing government in Israeli history — which means at some level the protests were also about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the role of religion in Israeli society. “The unspoken motivation driving the architects and supporters of the [judicial] ‘reform,’ as well as the protest leaders, is umbilically connected to the occupation,” writes Carolina Landsmann, a Haaretz columnist. If Netanyahu has his way, she writes, “There will be no more two-state solution, and there will be no territorial compromises. The new diplomatic horizon will be a single state, with the Palestinians as subjects deprived of citizenship.”
Nimrod Novik, the Israel Fellow at the Israel Policy Forum, said that “once awakened, the simmering resentment of those liberal Israelis about other issues was brought to the surface.” The Palestinian issue, for example, is at an “explosive moment,” said Novik: The Palestinian Authority is weakened and ineffective, Palestinian youth lack hope for a better future, and Israeli settlers feel emboldened by supporters in the ruling coalition. “The Israeli security establishment took this all into account when warning the government to change course before it is too late,” said Novik.
Kurtzer too noted that the Palestinians “also stand to be extremely victimized following the passage of judicial reform, both in Israel and in the West Bank.” And yet, he said, most Israelis aren’t ready to upend the current status quo between Israelis and Palestinians. “It can also be true that the Israeli public can only build the kind of coalition that it’s building right now because it is patently not a referendum on the issue of Palestinian rights,” he said.
Religion and state
Novik spoke about another barely subterranean theme of the protests: the growing power of the haredi, or ultra-Orthodox, parties. Secular Israelis especially resent that the haredim disproportionately seek exemption from military service and that non-haredi Israelis contribute some 90% of all taxes collected. One fear of those opposing the judicial reform legislation is that the religious parties will “forever secure state funding to the haredi Orthodox school system while exempting it from teaching the subjects required for ever joining the workforce. It is to secure for them an exemption from any military or other national service. And it is to expand the imposition of their lifestyle on non-Orthodox Israelis.”
What’s next
Predictions for the future range from warnings of a civil war (by Israel’s president, Isaac Herzog, among others) to an eventual compromise on Netanyahu’s part to the emergence of a new center electorate that will reject extremists on both ends of the political spectrum.
David E. Bernstein, a law professor at the George Mason University School of Law who writes frequently about Israel, imagines a future without extremists. “One can definitely easily imagine the business, academic and legal elite using their newfound political voice to insist that future governments not align with extremists, that haredi authority over national life be limited, and, perhaps most important, that Israel create a formal constitution that protects certain basic rights,” he said. “Perhaps there will also be demand to counter such long-festering problems as corruption, disproportionate influence over export markets by a few influential families, burgeoning lawlessness in the Arab sector and a massive shortage of affordable housing.”
Elie Bennett, director of International Strategy at the Israel Democracy Institute, also sees an opportunity in the crisis.
In the aftermath of the disastrous 1973 Yom Kippur war, he said, Israel “rebuilt its military and eventually laid the foundations for today’s ‘startup nation.’ In this current crisis, we do not need a call-up of our reserves forces, or a massive airlift of American weaponry to prevail. What we need is goodwill among fellow Israelis and a commitment to work together to strengthen our society and reach an agreed-upon constitutional framework. If we are able to achieve such an agreement, it will protect our rights, better define the relationships between the branches of government, and result in an Israel that is more stable and prosperous than ever as we celebrate 75 years of independence.”
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Yeshiva University fans gear up for Sweet Sixteen run — and a Shabbat in Atlanta
(JTA) — Yeshiva University’s men’s basketball team is set to play in the Sweet Sixteen round of March Madness on Friday, for the first time in the program’s history.
If that sentence sounds familiar, that’s because the YU Maccabees have qualified for the Division III tournament’s Sweet Sixteen once before, in 2020. But that tournament was cut short due to the COVID-19 outbreak, and they never got a chance to play the game.
“It’s always like, ‘What could have been,’ and now here they are — they’re back and they have a shot,” said Simmy Cohen, a YU superfan.
The Maccabees, who are 22-8, advanced past the first two rounds with a 71-69 win over Bates College, followed by a 92-69 win against the University of Maine-Farmington.
To advance to the Elite Eight, the Maccabees will need to defeat Emory University, the second-ranked team in DIII. As the higher seed, Emory gets to host the game at their home gym in Atlanta. But while the Maccabees are entering the game as underdogs, they have one possible advantage on their side: fans flooding in from near and far.
“I don’t think any other Division III basketball team has any national fanbase,” said Rabbi Adam Starr, a YU alum who leads Congregation Ohr HaTorah, a modern Orthodox synagogue in Atlanta.
“Other places have alumni, that’s one thing, but here it’s much more than alumni,” he said. “Certainly within the Orthodox Jewish world, but even beyond it’s something they’re rallying behind, whether they went to Yeshiva University or not. It’s just a Jewish pride story.”
Starr said Atlanta’s Jewish community will be out in full force to support YU, the private Jewish university in New York City. Some Atlantans are taking the day off work to catch the 1 p.m. tip-off, Starr said. Students from the local Jewish day school between seventh and 12th grade will be bussed to Emory’s Woodruff PE Center.
The game is also expected to draw Jewish fans from around the country, including Cohen’s sister-in-law, who will be driving from the New York metropolitan area.
“The interesting thing here is that Emory is on spring break, so most of their students are not around,” Starr said. “So I wouldn’t be surprised if it actually feels more like a YU home game than an Emory home game.”
There’s an added wrinkle for visiting fans: Because the game falls on a Friday afternoon, fans who observe Shabbat according to Jewish law will be doing so in Atlanta.
To help those observant supporters, a Google Form that pairs visitors with host families has circulated, titled “YU Mac Fans Shabbat Hospitality in Toco Hills Atlanta,” referring to the heavily Orthodox Jewish Toco Hills neighborhood.
“We’re known for our Southern Jewish hospitality,” Starr said.
The team itself, Starr added, is staying at a hotel, but will be “having meals in the community at one of the shuls.”
On Saturday afternoon, following kiddush, Starr will host a “Meet the Macs” panel discussion at Ohr HaTorah with head coach Elliot Steinmetz; assistant coach and Orthodox Union chief of staff Yoni Cohen; team captains Zevi Samet and Max Zakheim; and senior Tom Beza, who “previously served in a combat role” in the IDF, according to a flier for the event.
The team’s tournament run has taken place over the backdrop of war breaking out between the U.S. and Israel and Iran, which has hit close to home for YU, whose roster includes seven Israeli-born players.
“While we have your attention,” Steinmetz tweeted on Sunday, the day after their Round of 32 victory, “I’d like to point out that while we are here preparing for a stupid basketball game, our friends and family in Israel are going back and forth to bomb shelters multiple times a day as Iran and Hezbollah fire rockets indiscriminately at civilian populations. Take a minute out of your day and pray for their safety and victory.”
Starr said he views the Maccabees’ tournament run as “something good and positive” that Jewish people can “gather around.”
“And I’ve heard from people in Israel, this is a very welcome distraction for them,” Starr said. He remarked that his brother had to pull over on the way home from a wedding in Israel last week and lie flat on the ground due to a siren going off. “But he was listening to the game while this was going on,” Starr said.
Last week, Israeli guard Yoav Oselka led the way with 27 points in YU’s win against Maine-Farmington; Samet, the team’s leading scorer, put up 27 in their narrow 71-69 win over Bates in the Round of 64.
Emory, as one of the top DIII basketball programs, is the favorite to win Friday’s game. But Cohen said the energy from YU fans may help the Maccabees in their push for an upset.
“I think it’s going to be an electric atmosphere,” he said.
The post Yeshiva University fans gear up for Sweet Sixteen run — and a Shabbat in Atlanta appeared first on The Forward.
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California sues Oakland school district, saying district ignored order to address antisemitism
(JTA) — A large school district serving Oakland, California, is effectively defying state efforts to make it address antisemitism on its campuses, according to a lawsuit filed this week by the California Department of Education.
In January, the department ordered the Oakland Unified School District to send letters to families and staff condemning antisemitism and take several other steps. The lawsuit says the district failed to carry out any of them by the March 1 deadline.
The state filed suit on Monday in Alameda County Superior Court seeking a court order requiring the district to comply.
“OUSD has … unlawfully refused and failed to carry out the corrective actions,” the lawsuit says.
An OUSD spokesperson told the San Francisco Chronicle the district has a policy against commenting on pending litigation.
The dispute places Oakland schools in the middle of a broader national debate over how educators should address antisemitism amid the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. Many advocates say Jewish students need greater protection amid rising antisemitic incidents. Critics, however, argue that efforts to combat antisemitism are increasingly blurring the line between antisemitism and criticism of Israel or Zionism, raising free speech concerns.
In addition to requiring school officials to send districtwide letters condemning antisemitism, the state ordered staff training on nondiscrimination and political activity in schools, as well as a public presentation on the issue at a school board meeting.
The state also required the district to hold student assemblies at four schools — American Indian Model Schools, Thornhill Elementary, Montera Middle School and Oakland Technical High School — addressing the Holocaust, the meaning of the swastika and the harm caused by antisemitic imagery.
The dispute traces back to a series of complaints filed by Oakland attorney Marleen Sacks on behalf of the Oakland Jewish Alliance, a community group formed after the Oct. 7, 2023 attacks in Israel, alleging antisemitic incidents across the district’s schools.
After investigating, Oakland Unified issued a report in December addressing 17 complaints. The district concluded that discrimination against Jewish or Israeli individuals had occurred and that some practices in the district had contributed to what it described as a discriminatory environment.
Among the issues cited were pro-Palestinian posters displayed on campuses, teachers using instructional materials that presented the Gaza war from only one perspective, and staff using school resources to promote political advocacy related to the war.
The district also found that antisemitic graffiti had appeared on school property and acknowledged that some complaints about antisemitism were not addressed promptly.
State education officials intervened after reviewing the district’s findings and concluded that the remedies the district proposed were insufficient.
In a statement announcing the lawsuit, Sacks said she hopes the state’s intervention will force the district to address what she described as persistent discrimination affecting Jewish students.
“The District has been deliberately discriminating against and violating the rights of Jewish and Israeli students for years,” she said.
The case arrives amid broader legal disputes over antisemitism in California schools since the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attack on Israel and the war in Gaza that followed.
Last month, the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and the advocacy group StandWithUs filed a separate lawsuit accusing the state of California, its Department of Education and several school districts of failing to protect Jewish students from harassment and discrimination.
That lawsuit argues that antisemitism has become widespread in California’s public schools and seeks federal intervention.
The post California sues Oakland school district, saying district ignored order to address antisemitism appeared first on The Forward.
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California Police Open Hate Crime Probe After Assailants Attack 2 Jews Overheard Speaking Hebrew
Screenshot from video circulated on social media showing three unknown attackers punch two Israeli-Americans in San Jose, California on March 8, 2026.
Police in San Jose, California have opened a hate crime investigation after two Israeli-American Jews were overheard speaking Hebrew and then assaulted in broad daylight on Sunday.
“After arriving at a restaurant, they [the two Jewish men] were approached by three unknown individuals and punched multiple times, leaving one victim briefly unconscious,” according to a statement posted by the Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) for the Bay Area. “Both victims were transported to the emergency room and later released.”
JCRC is aware of a disturbing incident at Santana Row in San Jose in which two Israeli Americans were brutally attacked while speaking Hebrew. After arriving at a restaurant, they were approached by three unknown individuals and punched multiple times, leaving one victim briefly… pic.twitter.com/GZ9IkMnxfU
— JCRC Bay Area (@SFJCRC) March 10, 2026
An additional video from @jewishsf shows a closer vantage point of the assault.
According to one of the victims, one of the suspects uttered “f***ing Jew” while repeatedly beating him to the ground. pic.twitter.com/GClqx6lkRi
— JCRC Bay Area (@SFJCRC) March 10, 2026
Lior Zeevi, 47, and Daniel Levy, 48, waited for a table outside the Augustine restaurant on Sunday afternoon when the violence began. They told police that the three attackers used antisemitic language as they punched them.
According to one of the victims and local reports, one of the suspects said “f**king Jew” or “f**k the Jews” during the beating.
“Every punch connected directly to where they wanted, to the head directly. It was on purpose to hit and make maximum damage,” one of the victims told ABC7.
Levy lost consciousness briefly after one punch to the head on Sunday. The beating left him with his lower lip split and bleeding. Both men reportedly had swelling on their heads and faces following the attack.
According to ABC7, a witness also heard one of the assailants say, “Don’t mess with Iran,” apparently a reference to the current war in the Middle East.
Keanu Kahrobaie, a retail employee on Santana Row whose parents were born in Iran, filmed one of the videos and said he heard one of the attackers speak in Farsi while fleeing.
“The only logical thing I could think, other than to stop it, because there was way too many people, was to record it, because it could be used as evidence,” Kahrobaie told J. The Jewish News of Northern California. “They actually kind of carried him, then threw him to the ground, and then just continuously hit.’
San Jose’s Mayor Matt Mahan issued a statement condemning the attack.
“I’ve been in touch with Jewish community leaders and our police department regarding this heinous attack, and I will continue to update you as we make progress in our investigation,” he said.
“The attacks on two people speaking Hebrew in San Jose yesterday are reprehensible,” the mayor continued. “Our Jewish community is shocked and angry, and they have every right to be. In recent years in America, violent acts against Jews have nearly tripled and nearly 70 percent of all hate crimes involving religion target Jews.”
Mahan, who is now running for California governor, added that “this is a time to stand with our Jewish neighbors, support their freedoms, their rights, their full inclusion in American society, and it’s time to root out the hate and the ideologies that drive these kinds of violent acts.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s press office also shared the video on Wednesday and wrote, “This is disgusting. Thank you, San Jose PD, for investigating.”
Marco Sermoneta, consul general of Israel to the Pacific Northwest, commented on the beating on X.
“Two American-Israelis brutally attacked in broad daylight in #SanJose just for speaking Hebrew,” he posted. “I call on California elected officials to condemn this vile, cowardly act and for law enforcement to address this grave incident swiftly and effectively.”
On Wednesday, San Jose police said that detectives at this time “have not located evidence indicating the assault would meet the elements of a hate crime.” However, the attack is currently being investigated as a hate crime as investigators continue to review evidence.
The local Jewish community “is very afraid for our safety following this brutal assault in broad daylight,” Tali Klima, a spokesperson for the Bay Area Jewish Coalition, told the San Francisco Gate. “Given the ongoing surge in antisemitism in recent years, we expect San Jose police and local officials to take this matter seriously and take proper action to address not only this specific incident but the overall climate of Jew hatred.”
The attack in San Jose follow an ongoing pattern of antisemitic acts targeting Jews and Israelis who are overheard speaking in Hebrew.
Last month, French tourists attacked three Israelis speaking Hebrew at a bar in Thailand, resulting in hospitalization for two to treat injuries that included broken ribs, damaged teeth, and back trauma. The bar’s employees reportedly joined in the assault, hitting the Israelis with batons.
In December, Israeli tourist Almog Armoza had to flee in Nepal’s capital Kathmandu when someone hit him from behind with an iron rod after hearing him recording a voice message in Hebrew. That same month, criminals targeted an Israeli tourist in Cyprus after hearing him speaking Hebrew on his cell phone outside a hotel. The victim’s father wrote on Facebook that “he was brutally beaten, injured in the head and face, and evacuated for medical treatment.”
The prior month, police arrested a 25-year-old Pakistani man who allegedly assaulted an Orthodox Jewish American tourist at Milan’s Central Station.
In July, Ran Ben Shimon, the coach of Israel’s national soccer team, spoke Hebrew with assistant coach Gal Cohen while walking in Athens. This prompted an assault from a man who yelled “Free Palestine.” That same day, a waiter in Vienna refused service to a group of well-known Israeli classical musicians after they confirmed to him that the language he overhead them speaking was Hebrew.
Jewish organizations have begun tracking the prevalence of Hebrew conversations triggering antisemitic incidents. Following the release of a report on antisemitism in Ireland earlier this month, Maurice Cohen, chairman of the Jewish Representative Council of Ireland (JRCI), stated that “a recurring feature is hostility triggered solely by Jewish identity or perceived Jewish identity, including visible symbols, the Hebrew language, or accent.”
The researchers looking at Irish incidents found that in 30 percent of cases, the antisemitism only began after some reference to Jewish identity.
Surveys following the Oct. 7, 2023 terrorist attacks against southern Israel show that many Jews have begun concealing their Jewish identities when in public.
In February, the American Jewish Committee (AJC) in partnership with Hillel International released a survey of Jewish college students revealing that 34 percent made an effort to hide their Judaism to avoid experiencing antisemitism and that 38 percent refrained from voicing support for Israel out of fear of target by anti-Zionist activists.
According to AJC research of the broader Jewish public in March 2025, 56 percent say they changed their behavior out of fear of antisemitism and 40 percent said they refrained from wearing or showing items that could identify them as a Jew. The previous year that number was 26 percent.
Much higher numbers of Jews in the United Kingdom report similar sentiments. When the UK’s Campaign Against Antisemitism activist organization polled on the question in November 2023, 69 percent of British Jews said they were less likely to show their Judaism in public. However, by 2025, the Jewish Landscape Report from the Voice of the People initiative reported that number had now risen to 81 percent.