Defense Minister Yoav Gallant is working to postpone the vote scheduled for Monday on the controversial reasonableness standard bill, the Defense Minister’s Office confirmed after the report first broke on Channel 12 Friday night.
According to the report, Gallant has been holding talks with IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Herzi Halevi and the commander of the air force and believes that the current situation is “very worrisome.”
The report came after more than 1,000 Air Force reservists announced in a letter on Friday that they would stop their voluntary reserve duty, joining thousands of other soldiers mainly from the IDF's intelligence and special forces branches.
The defense minister reportedly also proposed to officials in both the coalition and opposition to postpone the beginning of the Knesset’s summer recess to come up with a compromise over the bill’s wording.
The recess is currently set to begin on Monday, July 31, making Sunday, July 30, the last day of legislation.
The coalition scheduled a special Knesset plenum on Sunday this week, instead of Wednesday, since the Tisha Be’av fast begins on Wednesday night. This leaves just four days of legislation – this Sunday through Tuesday, and next Sunday, for possible changes to the bill.
Since the bill was already approved on Thursday for its second and third reading by the Knesset’s Constitution, Law, and Justice Committee, the only way to insert changes into the law without having to reconvene the committee is by the coalition voting in favor of relevant changes that appear in some of the over-27,000 objections that the opposition filed.
The debate over the bill is set to begin in the Knesset plenum on Sunday at 10 a.m. and last 26 straight hours. Voting is scheduled to begin on Monday at 12 p.m. and last a number of hours, and the bill is therefore currently scheduled to pass into law on Monday afternoon or evening.
“I’m working in every way to achieve broad consensus, to prevent harming Israel’s security, and keep the IDF outside of the political debate,” Gallant’s office said later on Friday night.
Ynet reported on Friday that Gallant was joined by Shas chairman MK Arye Deri, who also reportedly expressed that he was against unilateral legislation.
Gallant almost got fired in March for calling to stop legislation
In March, Gallant called on the coalition to stop the judicial reform legislation shortly before the Knesset broke up for its Passover vacation. Reservists refusing to show up for duty was also a concern then.
As a result of Gallant’s public statement in March to stop the legislation, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fired him, saying he had lost trust in his defense minister. The move caused spontaneous widespread protests and a general strike the next day, at the end of which the prime minister consented to enter talks with the opposition.
Netanyahu eventually rescinded his firing of Gallant, citing "security reasons" after he was faced with pleas from both within the coalition and without to change his mind.
What is the reasonableness standard bill?
The reasonableness standard bill is an amendment to Basic Law: The Judiciary that would block the courts from applying what is known as the “reasonableness standard” to decisions made by elected officials. The standard is a common law doctrine that allows for judicial review against government administrative decisions that are deemed beyond the scope of what a responsible and reasonable authority would undertake.
The bill’s current wording bars the use of the standard for decisions made by the prime minister, the cabinet as a whole, or any specific minister. It also bars its use against a minister’s decision not to use his or her authority, and on ministers’ appointments of government workers.
A compromise proposal that was laid out last week by president and CEO of the Jewish People Policy Institute and former dean of the law faculty of Bar-Ilan University Yedidia Stern, along with former deputy attorney-general Raz Nizri, is that the bill will apply only to decisions made by the cabinet as a whole.
This means that appointments or policy decisions made in the cabinet will be immune from application of the reasonableness standard but the standard will still apply regarding decisions made by individual ministers.
If the decisions by individual ministers are on policy matters which are then ratified in the cabinet – they, too, will be exempt from the application of the reasonableness standard.
With regard to governmental appointments, Stern and Nizri’s proposal is that appointments that require the Knesset’s approval, such as appointments of ministers, will also be immune to the reasonableness standard, but appointments that do not require the Knesset’s approval, such as director-general of government ministries or senior bureaucratic positions, will be subject to review via the reasonableness standard.
Stern said last week that Netanyahu was seriously considering the compromise proposal, but that political considerations made it unclear whether or not the proposal will be accepted.
Channel 12 on Saturday quoted “senior coalition members” as saying that efforts to reach a compromise would continue “until the last minute,” but that without agreements the bill will pass as is.
“The government and coalition’s position is unequivocal: the greatest damage to the security and democracy of Israel is subjugating the government and Knesset to dictations of military units,” the coalition members said.