Israel judicial reform: Key bill becomes law amid mass protests

ISRAEL, July 24: Israeli MPs have passed into law a highly controversial bill despite mass protests which had aimed to thwart it.

The law removes the power of the Supreme Court to overrule government actions it considers unreasonable.

It is the first in a series of bitterly contested reforms aimed at curbing the power of courts to be approved.

The planned reforms have triggered some of the biggest protests in Israel's history, with opponents warning they imperil Israel as a democracy.

The government argues that the measures are necessary to correct an imbalance in power which has seen the courts increasingly intervene in political decisions in recent decades.

Hours before the final vote, police used water cannon and arrested protesters outside Israel's parliament (Knesset) in Jerusalem.

The vote brings to head months of turmoil, with Israel's president warning political leaders on Monday that the country was "in a state of national emergency".

On Monday morning protesters blocking a boulevard outside the Knesset were sprayed with water cannon and pulled off the road by police amid a cacophony of noise from drums, whistles and air horns.

One protester was hurt, local media say, and six were arrested, police said. Other protesters surrounded a police van shouting "shame" at officers.

A demonstrator lying in the street told the BBC he was defying "dictatorship", adding that his grandfather had been a wartime codebreaker against the Nazis at the UK's famous Bletchley Park.

Asked how long he would stay put he said: "We will never surrender".

(BBC)