As the Knesset prepares to dissolve itself ahead of the most pivotal election in decades, the coalition is quietly yet methodically racing to advance one of the defining pieces of its legislative agenda: a bill gutting the powers of the attorney general as part of a long-running effort to weaken one of Israel’s few checks on government power.

The legislation, which would effectively strip the attorney general of authority over the government by allowing ministers to disregard the attorney general’s currently binding legal opinions and decide for themselves whether their actions are lawful, is expected to be brought for a final vote in the plenum this week.

The Knesset’s Constitution committee approved the bill for its final readings on Sunday, with coalition lawmakers racing to pass as much legislation they view as vital as possible before parliament dissolves on July 17.

Aside from defanging the potency of the attorney general’s opinions, the bill would give the coalition effective control over appointing and dismissing the person holding the office, replacing the current system under which the cabinet acts on the recommendation of an independent public committee headed by a retired Supreme Court justice.

But the legislation is about far more than the future of a single office. To many critics and boosters alike, the effort represents the latest stage in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government’s larger war on the judiciary, which began shortly after the government assumed power in 2023.

In the months before Hamas’s October 7 attack shifted the national agenda, the judicial overhaul agenda sparked mass protests grounded in accusations that the coalition was attempting to fundamentally dismantle Israeli democracy.

Among the top boosters and architects of the overhaul effort has been Religious Zionism MK Simcha Rothman, a relative newcomer to the Knesset who chairs its Constitution, Law and Justice Committee.

Rothman has spent much of the government’s term advancing legislation aimed at curbing the powers of the courts, altering the selection of judges and other legal gatekeepers.

The lawmaker and coalition ministers have repeatedly accused Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara of thwarting the government’s agenda. After the High Court of Justice froze the government’s decision to dismiss her last year, lawmakers instead turned to Rothman’s legislation to dramatically curtail the powers of the office itself.

The decision was just one of many struck down or frozen by the High Court for failing to comply with the law or the de facto constitution in recent years. The coalition, which has pressed ahead with efforts to weaken the judiciary, reshape the judicial appointments process and curtail the powers of the attorney general, has recently shifted to vowing to openly defy High Court rulings, amid an incendiary campaign to delegitimize and vilify the judiciary.

Critics of the attorney general legislation and the judicial overhaul writ large see it as an effort to remove the few existing constraints on executive power, giving the elected majority carte blanche to do as it pleases, whether lawful or not, within a political system that already lacks the institutional safeguards common in other democracies.

Supporters argue that reforms are needed to restore authority to democratically elected officials, whom they say have become subordinate to an unelected judiciary and legal establishment wielding powers unmatched in other democracies.

“Today, the strongest branch in all aspects is the judiciary,” said Rothman, who offered The Times of Israel a rare window into the constitutional philosophy that has animated the government’s judicial project for nearly four years. “The Knesset is weak and the executive is somewhere in between.”

The bill would not affect the attorney general’s authority as head of the state prosecution, including decisions on whether to open criminal investigations into senior elected officials, as had been proposed in an earlier version of the legislation.

In an effort to speed the bill’s passage, the coalition removed those provisions but has said it will pursue them in separate legislation if reelected on October 27.

Rothman said more efforts to constrain the judiciary will be on the agenda as well should he return to power, including establishing an override clause to allow a simple Knesset majority to overturn High Court rulings.

Who really holds power in Israel?

At the heart of Rothman’s constitutional philosophy is a striking inversion of the central criticism leveled at the coalition’s........

© The Times of Israel