Hundreds of anti-government protesters were walking from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem early Wednesday as they sought to step up pressure on lawmakers ahead of an expected vote on legislation that would repeal an element of court oversight over the government.
Activists, including some leaders of the massive grassroots protest movement, announced the march late Tuesday as police turned away thousands of protesters who gathered in Tel Aviv and other cities against government plans at the end of a day of widespread demonstrations. Rallies were held at various places.
Marching with flags and to the noise of megaphones and vuvuzelas, the crowd headed east on Route 1, the main highway connecting the cities, shortly after midnight. They spent the night at a camping site at Ariel Sharon Park, a landfill and nature center about seven kilometers (4 miles) from the main protest site on Kaplan Street in Tel Aviv, and planned to resume the march at 6 am.
They are expected to reach Jerusalem, about 65 kilometers (40 miles) from Tel Aviv, by Friday afternoon in order to be there for a possible vote in the Knesset on Sunday on the so-called “rationality” bill.
“The goal is to support those who need to make difficult decisions, to support them to make the right choices,” said Shikma Bresler, the protest leader who organized the four-day march, according to the Ynet news site.
The bill, which was being pushed through committee in a marathon all-night session on Wednesday morning, would bar courts from using the legal concept of reasonableness to overturn government decisions, such as the one for governing leader Arya Derry. Cabinet appointees, who were disqualified. He appears to have told the courts he would quit politics as part of a plea deal on tax offences.
The legislation’s passage to the Knesset was being slowed by thousands of opposition objections, which were dismissed at breakneck speed by the Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee in an all-night session on Wednesday morning.
Night at 00:30. Wednesday. Route 1.
Ariel leaving Sharon Park tomorrow at 6:00am.
join on foot or by car pic.twitter.com/1DhGFV0kTm– Shikma Bressler (@ShikmaBressler) 18 July 2023
Bressler said the crowd of marchers was much larger than he had anticipated when he announced the plan the day before, and invited more people to join in the coming days. He said those who have difficulty in walking can join by car.
The march came at the end of a day when thousands took to the streets across the country for a weekly “day of resistance” against the government’s plan to make radical changes to the judiciary. The protesters managed to block the Ayalon Freeway, which runs through Tel Aviv, for about two hours, until police used water cannons to clear the road and reopened it around midnight.
Demonstrators stand amid water cannon spray fired by riot police during a protest against the government’s judicial overhaul bill in Tel Aviv on July 18, 2023. (JACK GUEZ / AFP)
Police said that 45 people were arrested throughout the day.
More protests were planned for Wednesday, including a two-hour “warning strike” called by the Israel Medical Association, which represents health professionals.
There is a long tradition of marches to Jerusalem by protest groups ranging from settlers to asylum seekers to draw attention to causes or issues, although the long journey to the city may also limit the number of participants.
Anti-overhaul activists protest against the government’s judicial overhaul near the Supreme Court in Jerusalem on July 18, 2023. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
“Jewish people have made pilgrimages to Jerusalem for thousands of years. We understand that the balance of the country is out of whack, so we are trying to bring it back to the center,” Moshe Radman, a protest leader and high-tech entrepreneur, told Ynet.
“Our goal is for millions of citizens to go to Jerusalem to create a scene unprecedented in history. … I hope this step wakes up the destructive government from its anger.
