Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu spoke to the press on Wednesday evening following a day of violent protests against the government’s judicial reform plan. As he was speaking, his wife Sara was stuck in a hair salon in Tel Aviv as an angry mob of protesters gathered outside.

“Citizens of Israel, the right to demonstrate is a fundamental democratic value; however, freedom to demonstrate is not freedom to bring the country to a halt,” Netanyahu said. “The person who said this 20 years ago was the former President of the Supreme Court, Aharon Barak. It was correct then and it is also correct today. The freedom to demonstrate is not a license to drive the country into anarchy, to chaos, because a sovereign country cannot tolerate anarchy.

“I know among you are many citizens who love the country and who fervently support the judicial reform. I also know that there are many other citizens who also love the country, who oppose the reform with the same fervor.

“But in a democracy, there are clear rules on how to have a debate. There are red lines that cannot be crossed and it does not matter how deep, stormy, and emotional the debate is. The sharp and clear red line is that violence and anarchy are absolutely forbidden.

“Yesterday in Hawara, following the awful murder of two wonderful brothers, I told the lawbreakers: We will not tolerate a situation in which everybody does what they deem fit. We cannot tolerate violence. We cannot tolerate assaulting police officers. We cannot tolerate blocking highways. We cannot tolerate threatening public figures and their families, something that is happening right now in Tel Aviv. We will not allow lawbreaking and violence anywhere.

“Twenty years ago, the debate among us was no less stormy, no less wrenching, and no less all-embracing. An entire public that deeply opposed the government’s policy felt that its world was being destroyed. Twenty years ago, in the Disengagement, the Government of Israel decided to uproot over 8,000 Israelis from their homes, exhume bodies, and destroy their communities.

“Those who opposed the policy of the government saw their life’s work crumbling and many of them believed with all their heart that this was the start of the destruction of the third Beit Hamikdash. They set out on a sharp and determined struggle, a pointed and powerful public struggle that encompassed many people in the country.

“But I will also say something else; I know that this is not everyone. I would like to call on all of us to listen to Esti Yaniv, the mother of the boys, who was expelled from Gush Katif, and lost her two boys on Monday, at the hardest moment of her life, she called for unity and she is right.

“I am again calling for calm. I am calling for a halt to the violence and I believe and hope that we will soon find a path to dialogue. Nobody will raise a hand to his fellow, because we are brothers. We have no other country. ‘Each one shall help his fellow, and to his brother he shall say, “Strengthen yourself.’ [Isaiah 41:6].”

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)