Do Netanyahu's judicial reforms threaten the existence of Israel?

The most pessimistic Israeli would not have expected that the entity to which he belongs would reach this level of societal fragmentation and internal polarization in the wake of Benjamin Netanyahu's government embarking on judicial reforms.

The main aim is to provide legal and political pathways to save him from prosecution in corruption cases.

This polarization, and the accompanying unprecedented mass protests, has become a threat to the future of Israel as a state, as it is causing severe damage to its vital institutions, the immunity of its society, and its economic strength.

There is no dispute that the fulfillment of the signatories of these petitions to their obligations means threatening the existence of many vital arms in the army, or at least greatly reducing their effectiveness.

Participants in the mass protests argue that the judicial reforms will put an end to Israeli "democracy" and will enable the religious current to transform Israel into a theocratic state that affects the ability of the secular to live according to their principles, in addition to that it will empower the religious currents - whose absolute majority of their affiliates do not contribute to the labor market. And evades military service - from plundering the state treasury and directing it in its favour.

The mass protests rejecting the judicial reforms greatly threaten the army and its unity and could greatly reduce its ability to perform its war effort and carry out its military operations, which is one of the most important elements that guarantee the survival of Israel.

Given that most of the participants in the protests are mainly officers and soldiers in the reserve forces, they have resorted to a dangerous form of protest, which is to widely sign petitions declaring their commitment to stop performing military service if the government insists on moving ahead with judicial reforms.

What exacerbates this dangerous development is the fact that Israel - unlike all countries in the world - relies in the performance of its war effort on the reserve forces and not the regular forces, as 70% of the war effort falls on the shoulders of officers and reserve soldiers.

There is no dispute that the fulfillment of the signatories of these petitions to their obligations means threatening the existence of many vital arms in the army, or at least greatly reducing their effectiveness.

Among the thousands of reserve officers who signed these petitions are hundreds of pilots in the Air Force, which is the striking force of Israel, where the reserve officers in this particular weapon play a central role.

According to Nir Dvori, the military commentator on Channel 12, most of the bombing operations carried out by the Israeli Air Force in Syria and Gaza, for example, are carried out by officers in the reserve forces.

Those threatened to stop performing military service were joined by senior officers and commanders in the special operations system in which they are active in carrying out military operations “behind the enemy’s borders”, officers in special units, and the electronic espionage unit known as “8200”, which is described in Tel Aviv. As the "crown jewel" of the intelligence establishment, it is responsible for carrying out cyber attacks in cyberspace, and other arms.

Former Prime Minister and Chief of Staff Ehud Barak called on army officers and soldiers to reject the government's instructions as an "illegitimate" government.

And given that all indications indicate that the Netanyahu government is moving forward in passing "judicial reforms", the possibility that Israel will lose a large amount of the contribution of the reserve forces is great.

The government is continuing to pass these reforms, not only because they serve Netanyahu's personal interests, but also because the religious parties participating in them see in these reforms an opportunity that will not be repeated to resolve the conflict over the character of the state and reformulate the relationship between religion and state in a way that is consistent with its jurisprudential views and ideological premises by exploiting neutralization. The influence of the judiciary, specifically the Supreme Court.

It goes without saying that the dissolution of the reserve forces will harm Israel's ability to face security challenges in the Palestinian and regional arenas.

What exacerbates matters is that these developments coincide with Iran making great strides in developing its nuclear program, especially after the US Department of Defense announced last week that Tehran could obtain the amount of enriched uranium needed to build a nuclear bomb within 12 days.

Although Netanyahu announced shortly after the formation of his ruling coalition that confronting the Iranian nuclear program is the main priority of his government, the widespread threat of refusing military service will reduce Israel's ability to offer a military option to confront this "threat".

Although the official Israeli television channel has recently quoted Israeli military leaders as questioning the ability of the army and security services to confront the explosive security situation in the West Bank, Jerusalem and Palestine, especially during the month of Ramadan or during the Jewish holidays due to the limited manpower available to address this "threat". If the reservists fulfilled their threats, things would be more difficult.

At the same time, the protest movement undermines the internal legitimacy enjoyed by the government, which reduces the level of support for its decisions on the military and security levels.

Former Prime Minister and Chief of Staff Ehud Barak called on army officers and soldiers to reject the government's instructions as an "illegitimate" government.

In terms of the economic repercussions of the judicial reforms, the situation looks even more tragic.

Fearing that judicial reforms would affect the investment environment, a number of large companies announced their departure from the Israeli market, in addition to the fact that 20% of these companies withdrew their deposits from banks.

According to bank managers in Israel, the transfer of accounts from their banks abroad has increased 10 times since the announcement of the judicial reforms.

The value of the local currency, the shekel, declined dramatically against the dollar, which made the Israelis withdraw their shares from investment funds that deal in shekels.

Matters were further complicated by the fact that most of the companies that left the Israeli market or those threatening to leave it are concerned with advanced technologies and cyber, which will lead to a slowdown in economic growth, as the exports of these companies annually generate more than $8 billion to Israel.

At the same time, protests against judicial reforms and government supporters' responses to them are accompanied by violent practices, raising the risk of large-scale clashes between the two sides.

Bearing in mind that even before the introduction of judicial reforms, warnings in Israel of the danger of civil war erupted on ideological, ethnic and religious grounds.

The protest movement against judicial reforms fueled a war of identities between the parties in the Israeli arena: religious versus secular, eastern versus western, veterans versus new immigrants.

On the other hand, the passage of judicial reforms may be associated with a decline in Israel's standing in the West, particularly in the United States.

Both Israel and the United States have always claimed that "common values" and specifically appeal to "democracy" are the most important denominators that strengthen the ties between the two sides.

It is clear that the passage of judicial reforms that bring down the curtain on the separation of powers in Israel will affect the ability of both Washington and Tel Aviv to continue marketing this justification.

This made the US administration request clarifications from the Netanyahu government about the goals and objectives of the judicial reforms.

Despite the serious repercussions of imposing judicial reforms on Israel's interests and the safety of its society, there is no indication that there is a consensual path that can save Israel from these repercussions.

This is precisely what prompted a number of former senior Israeli officials to call for examining the possibility of dividing Israel into 3 cantons.

A canton for the followers of the religious trend, another for the secular, and a third for the Palestinians of the interior.

And according to what was revealed by "The Marker" newspaper last Friday, according to these officials, only dividing Israel into cantons can guarantee an end to the Haredi religious movement continuing to monopolize defining the nature of the relationship between religion and the state and draining the state treasury by exploiting its political influence, which stems mainly from its weight. growing demographic.

What the former Israeli officials suggested may seem illogical at the present time, but it indicates the nature of the political, societal and economic impasse that Israel has ended up with.

Perhaps this is what made the former Mossad chief, Tamir Pardo, more pessimistic about the future of Israel, as he expected that the Netanyahu government would contribute to putting an "end to the Zionist dream" through its insistence on judicial reforms.

The entrustment of a large segment of Israelis to Netanyahu, despite his storming of the Israeli political system and pushing this entity to face catastrophic consequences, serves his personal interests.

It indicates the waning of the Zionist idea as a uniting bond for the Jews, and it may establish the decline of this entity and reduce its ability to survive.