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Netanyahu vows more active role in Israel’s judiciary fight following a day of tense protests
(JTA) — After a day of raucous protests, arrests and clashes in the street protesting the Israeli government’s controversial judicial overhaul, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave a televised speech encouraging Israeli unity, pledging to protect minority rights — and vowing that the first major piece of the overhaul plan would still pass next week.
Netanyahu’s speech followed a “National Day of Paralysis” Thursday, in which protesters amassed in large cities across Israel, where they blocked major roads and were met with mounted police and water cannons, as they have at previous protests.
More than 100 protesters were arrested, including Shikma Schwartzman-Bressler, a physicist who is one of the leaders of the protest movement, according to video posted by Israeli journalist Tal Schneider. Another video shared by Schneider showed a former cabinet member and Labor Party politician, Omer Bar-Lev, getting pushed by police at a protest. Demonstrations stretched into the night following Netanyahu’s speech, as well.
Netanyahu’s address, which took a more conciliatory tone than previous remarks he’s made on the subject, followed reports of dissent within his own party, and following a morning in which his government passed the first of several laws that would limit the power of the Supreme Court. The one approved Thursday specifically bars the court from forcing the prime minister into taking a leave of absence.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu seen during a discussion and a vote in the assembly hall of the Knesset, the Israeli parliament in Jerusalem, March 22, 2023. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
“Opponents of the reform are not traitors and supporters of the reform are not fascists,” he said. “The vast majority of Israeli citizens, across the political spectrum, love our country, and want to protect our democracy. … I am working to reach a solution. I am attentive to the claims of the other side.”
He added, “We intend, and I intend, to anchor individual rights in law. We will ensure the basic rights of all citizens of Israel: Jews and non-Jews, secular and religious, women, LGBT, everyone — without exception. … We intend to propose clear legislation clear on this subject. I will personally make sure that that happens.”
But Netanyahu defended the overhaul plan as “a strengthening of democracy” that brings Israel’s judicial system in line with the legal systems of democracies such as the United States. He cited remarks by Harvard Law professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz, who has opposed parts of the overhaul plan but said recently that it will not turn Israel “into an autocratic country.”
Netanyahu said his government would still bring the first major piece of the legislation — which gives the coalition control over two Supreme Court appointments per term — to the floor of parliament next week as planned.
“In all the democracies, including the United States, elected officials are those who choose judges,” Netanyahu said. “Is the United States not a democracy? Is New Zealand not a democracy? Is Canada not a democracy?”
(Several critics of Netanyahu’s plan say that the United States’ system is different and has protections and checks and balances that Israel’s governmental system lacks.)
Israelis face off during a protest against the Israeli government’s planned judicial overhaul, in Bnei Brak, March 23, 2023. (Avshalom Sassoni/Flash90)
The protests — which included a demonstration in Bnai Brak, a haredi Orthodox city — came shortly after Israel’s government passed the first piece of a string of legislation aimed at significantly limiting the power of Israel’s Supreme Court. The law, which insulates Netanyahu from court-ordered restrictions related to his ongoing trial for corruption, was approved by a bare majority of lawmakers at 6 a.m. on Thursday after a night of fierce debate.
It bars the Supreme Court from ordering a prime minister to take a leave of absence, and says that a prime minister can be removed only if he or she is physically or mentally incapacitated, and only if 75% of government ministers or Knesset lawmakers approve of the decision.
The change appears to open the door for Netanyahu to play a more assertive role in the fight over the broader package of judicial reform bills, which would sap the Supreme Court of much of its power and independence. Israel’s attorney general had ordered Netanyahu to constrain his involvement in the debate over the overhaul because of a conflict of interest related to his ongoing trial. Netanyahu has repeatedly defended the overhaul in public remarks, and with this law on the books, the court will not be able to remove him from office for violating the gag order.
“Tonight I tell you, my friends, citizens of Israel: No more,” Netanyahu said in his speech. “I’m coming in.”
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UK PM Starmer Says There Could Be New Powers to Ban Pro-Palestinian Marches
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer gives a media statement at Downing Street in London, Britain, April 30, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Jack Taylor/File photo
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the government could ban pro-Palestinian marches in some circumstances because of the “cumulative effect” the demonstrations had on the Jewish community after two Jewish men were stabbed in London on Wednesday.
Starmer told the BBC that he would always defend freedom of expression and peaceful protest, but chants like “Globalize the Intifada” during demonstrations were “completely off limits” and those voicing them should be prosecuted.
Pro-Palestinian marches have become a regular feature in London since the October 2023 attack by Hamas on Israel that triggered the Gaza war. Critics say the demonstrations have generated hostility and become a focus for antisemitism.
Protesters have argued they are exercising their democratic right to spotlight ongoing human rights and political issues related to the situation in Gaza.
Starmer said he was not denying there were “very strong legitimate views about the Middle East, about Gaza,” but many people in the Jewish community had told him they were concerned about the repeat nature of the marches.
Asked if the tougher response should focus on chants and banners, or whether the protests should be stopped altogether, Starmer said: “I think certainly the first, and I think there are instances for the latter.”
“I think it’s time to look across the board at protests and the cumulative effect,” he said, adding that the government needed to look at what further powers it could take.
Britain raised its terrorism threat level to “severe” on Thursday amid mounting security concerns that foreign states were helping fuel violence, including against the Jewish community.
“We are seeing an elevated threat to Jewish and Israeli individuals and institutions in the UK,” the head of counter-terrorism policing, Laurence Taylor, said in a statement, adding that police were also working “against an unpredictable global situation that has consequences closer to home, including physical threats by state-linked actors.”
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War Likely to Resume After Trump’s Rejection of Latest Proposal, Says IRGC General
Iranians carry a model of a missile during a celebration following an IRGC attack on Israel, in Tehran, Iran, April 15, 2024. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS
i24 News – A senior Iranian military figure said that fighting with the US was “likely” to resume after President Donald Trump stated he was dissatisfied with Tehran’s latest proposal, regime media reported on Saturday.
The comments of General Mohammad Jafar Asadi, one of the top Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commanders, were relayed by the Fars news agency, considered as a mouthpiece of the the powerful paramilitary body.
“Evidence has shown that the Americans do not not adhere to any commitments,” Asadi was quoted as saying.
He further added that Washington’s decision-making was “primarily media-driven aimed first at preventing a drop in oil prices and second at extricating themselves from the mess they have created.”
Iranian armed forces are ready “for any new adventures or foolishness from the Americans,” he said, going to assert that the Iran war would prove for the US a tragedy comparable with what was for Israel the October 7 massacre.
“Just as our martyred Leader said that the Zionist regime will never be the same as before the Al‑Aqsa Storm operation [the name chosen by Hamas leadership for the October 7, 2023 massacre in southern Israel], the United States will also never return to what it was before its attack on Iran,” he said. “The world has understood the true nature of America, and no matter how much malice it shows now, it is no longer the America that many once feared.”
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Trump Says US Navy Acting ‘Like Pirates’ to Carry Out Naval Blockade of Iranian Ports
A view of Iranian-flagged cargo ship M/V Touska as the US Navy Arleigh Burke-class Aegis guided missile destroyer USS Spruance conducts its interception in a location given as the north Arabian Sea, in this screen capture from a video released April 19, 2026. Photo: CENTCOM/Handout via REUTERS
President Donald Trump said on Friday the US Navy was acting “like pirates” in carrying out Washington’s naval blockade of Iranian ports during the US and Israel’s war against Iran.
Trump made the comments while describing the seizure by US forces of a ship a few days ago.
“We took over the ship, we took over the cargo, we took over the oil. It’s a very profitable business,” Trump said in remarks on Friday evening. “We’re like pirates. We’re sort of like pirates but we are not playing games.”
Some of Tehran’s vessels have been seized by the US after leaving Iranian ports, along with sanctioned container ships and Iranian tankers in Asian waters.
Iran has blocked nearly all ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz apart from its own since the start of the war. Trump has imposed a separate blockade of Iranian ports.
The US and Israel attacked Iran on February 28. Iran responded with its own strikes on Israel and Gulf states that host US bases. US-Israeli strikes on Iran and Israeli attacks in Lebanon have killed thousands and displaced millions.
The war has raised oil prices and led to the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint for about 20 percent of global oil and liquefied natural gas shipments.
Trump, who has offered shifting timelines and goals for the war that remains unpopular in the US, has faced widespread condemnation over his comments on the conflict, including when he threatened to destroy Iran’s entire civilization last month.
Many US experts said last month that American strikes on Iran may amount to war crimes after Trump threatened to target civilian infrastructure.