This Monday, July 24, The Israeli Parliament has approved a controversial clause of the judicial reform project in the midst of the opposition boycott. and in the middle of new mobilizationsproduced this past weekend at the national level against the plans of the Executive of the prime minister of the country, Benjamin Netanyahu. This clause is known as the ‘good sense clause’.

The vote has obtained 64 votes in favor (0 against) after the parliamentarians of all the opposition parties decided to leave the plenary session of the Knesset at the insistence of the Government to move it forward, as reported by the Israeli newspaper ‘Haaretz’. This is a clause that enables the courts to annul a government decision if they consider that it goes against the democratic system, after the collapse of the talks between the Executive and the opposition.

So, shortly before the vote, Yoav Gallant and Yariv Levin, defense and justice ministers respectively, have held a strong discussion between cries of “shame” from the opposition benches. Gallant himself later spoke with the leader of the opposition Yesh Atid, former Prime Minister Yair Lapid, without further details.

Thus, last-minute efforts to amend the draft clause or manage to reactivate the talks between the Government and the opposition have proven unsuccessfulafter 30 hours of debate on it, which have included the rejection of 140 reservations presented by the opposition.

Immediately after the vote, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich applauded the result and argued that the coalition “has done everything possible until the last moment, but unfortunately the opposition has opposed it”, as reported by the newspaper ‘The Times of Israel’.

For his part, Levin has extolled what he has described as “a first step in a historic process to correct the judicial system“, while Netanyahu has left the plenary without comment after voting. ‘Bibi’ had arrived shortly before after being discharged after undergoing surgery on Sunday to fit a pacemaker.

The session was held in the midst of a concentration by thousands of people in front of the Knesset headquarters to protest against the project, amid accusations about an alleged plan by the authorities to carry out an institutional “coup” through the reform project. The police have used water cannons during the protest, which has resulted in at least twelve detainees and five demonstrators slightly injured.

Before the vote, Smotrich has denounced that “a violent siege designed to prevent members of the Knesset from exercising their right and duty to vote in plenary session is not democracy.” “This is the Capitol,” she warned, referring to the assault on January 6, 2021 by followers of the former US president donald trump who rejected the result of the November elections of the previous year, in which the Democratic candidate and current president prevailed, Joe Biden.

The US president, Joe Biden, has demanded in the last hours that Netanyahu “do not rush” when it comes to moving forward with the reform and has maintained in statements to the Axios portal that “it seems” that the government proposal “is becoming more divisive, instead of less”.

Critics of the judicial reform argue that it is an attack on Israel’s balance of powers, fundamentally on the foundations on which democracy is based, since it gives Parliament unusual influence to overturn judicial decisions.