As first published in The Times by Inna Lazareva.
Between them, they have been labelled “Madame Mao of the insurrection”, a “legal tyrant” and “the most dangerous person in Israel”.
One has faced calls to be indicted, another was briefly arrested, two were threatened with dismissal. All three women are constantly warned about their safety because of their opposition to the Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s divisive judicial reform programme, which has set off unprecedented protests and division across the nation all year.
At a time when many women in Israel feel that their rights are under attack, these three — Dr Shikma Bressler, a particle physicist turned protest leader; Justice Esther Hayut, a daughter of Holocaust survivors who is the president of the Supreme Court; and Gali Baharav-Miara, a former civil servant who is the country’s first female attorney-general — are widely seen as the leading defenders of Israel’s democracy.
“So as long as we cannot guarantee that our liberal democracy is secure for years to come, we have to fight for it,” Bressler, a particle physicist turned protest leader, said
Outside politics, Bressler is a professor running a laboratory and a member of a team at the European Organisation for Nuclear Research in Switzerland. Yet in recent years she has become one of the country’s most prominent protest leaders and is instantly recognisable, her voice usually heard bellowing the words “De-mo-cra-cy!’ at the weekly demonstrations in Tel Aviv. Talking on the phone last week while stuck in a traffic jam, after 36 weeks of shouting, her voice sounded a little croaky yet her words remained full of fire.
“This government has already demonstrated what they are willing to sacrifice to achieve their goals — they don’t care that the army breaks apart, they don’t care that the economy breaks apart, that the educational system breaks apart,” Bressler said. “So as long as we cannot guarantee that our liberal democracy is secure for years to come, we have to fight for it.”
Since January Israel has been split over a radical judicial overhaul for which the most right-wing government in the country’s history is pushing. The plan aims to limit the independence of the courts, which many in the coalition government and their supporters see as unrepresentative. This has triggered a constitutional crisis over judicial independence and prompted strikes among doctors, hi-tech entrepreneurs, trade unionists and military reservists. Protesters have paralysed transport arteries including, briefly, the main airport, and have been taking to the streets every week for the past nine months. It is the biggest civil action movement the country has witnessed.
Last week Israel’s highest court began a historically consequential hearing on the validity of a law that imposes curbs on the court’s power to overturn government decisions that it finds “extremely unreasonable”. The proceedings, which have been beamed live on large screens in municipal squares, cut to the heart of arguments over Israel’s legal identity as a “Jewish and democratic state”. So bitter is the battle that President Herzog warned in March that it could prompt a civil war.
Hayut was among the first high-profile figures to denounce the reform, which she called a “plan to crush the justice system” and give Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, a “blank cheque” to pass any legislation it pleases.
She has since faced unsuccessful calls to be disqualified from hearing petitions against the reforms.
Born in a refugee camp in Israel in 1953 to Holocaust survivor parents from Romania, Hayut was a singer in the Israeli Defence Forces’ (IDF) band during her military service before turning to law. She was appointed chief justice in 2017 and is approaching mandatory retirement next month when she turns 70. Many see Hayut’s opposition to the reform as the defining moment of her life’s work.
Baharav-Miara has been called “the last line of defence before the destruction of Israeli democracy” by the liberal daily Haaretz newspaper. Before taking office as attorney-general last year, she spent three decades as a civil servant and a lawyer. Until this year her official legal positions seldom contradicted the government. She allowed it to launch a military operation in Gaza without first convening the cabinet last year, and successfully fought a lawsuit brought by the parents of Rachel Corrie, a 23-year-old American human rights activist killed by an Israeli army bulldozer while trying to prevent the demolition of a Palestinian house in Gaza.
But when the judicial reform plan was announced, Baharav-Miara became one of its most prominent opponents, warning that it would create an “imbalanced system of checks and balances” that “will push other democratic values into a corner”. Several government ministers, including Yariv Levin, the justice minister, and Itamar Ben Gvir, the minister of national security — who has a conviction for inciting violence and hate speech — have called for her to be fired. She has clashed repeatedly with Netanyahu, whose corruption trial she is also overseeing. Baharav-Miara is one of the most threatened people in the country, protected by security guards.
Israel has a legacy of powerful women. Fifty years ago its first and only female prime minister, Golda Meir, led the country to victory in the Yom Kippur War, a story depicted in the film Golda, with Dame Helen Mirren playing the role of Israel’s “iron lady”, which will open in British cinemas next month.
But women’s rights in Israel are under growing pressure. Hardly a day goes by without anecdotal reports in official and social media documenting harassment of women on public transport.
There was outrage among the liberal secular sector of society in August when a bus driver sent a group of teenage girls to the back of the bus.
“This is no error, it’s policy. The Israeli government is actively excluding and erasing women from everywhere,” said the Bonot Alternativa (Building an Alternative) group, which boasts about 100,000 women members in 80 cities. The association has been one of the most visually striking parts of the weekly antigovernment protests, featuring women dressed in scarlet silently marching as handmaidens from Margaret Atwood’s dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale.
Bressler said that the incidents on public transport are only the tip of the iceberg. “There are places in Israel where women are not allowed to walk on certain sidewalks,” she said, adding that women were excluded from working at some companies, and photos of women were routinely erased from public advertisements and signs.
Discrimination goes to the top. Whereas the previous government left behind a record nine women as director generals of ministries, since the new government came to power, almost all have been replaced by men. Only nine women are included in the 64-member ruling coalition, with a mere six female ministers out of 32. Two parties in Netanyahu’s coalition ban women from running for office, in violation of a Supreme Court ruling.
Israel ranks 83rd out of 146 countries for gender parity according to the World Economic Forum, down from 60th place last year. Femicide has risen by 50 per cent over the past year but the government has refused to ratify the Istanbul convention opposing violence against women.
“It’s clear that those supporting judicial reform do not accept equality as stated in the Israeli declaration of independence,” said Tzipi Livni, a former justice minister. “Until now the Supreme Court forced the Orthodox community and the government to accord equality to women.” Weakening the power of the court therefore “harms gender equality in Israel”.