Critics panned Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich on Tuesday after he shared an AI-generated video on behalf of his far-right Religious Zionism party that depicted security personnel forcibly removing two Supreme Court justices and the attorney general from a protest.

The start of the 34-second video imagines Supreme Court President Isaac Amit being dragged across the pavement at a rowdy protest, as he holds a “No Smotrich!!!” sign; then, it shows fellow justice Daphne Barak-Erez, and then Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara being similarly grabbed, each by three men in yellow vests. At the end, a defeated Amit is depicted walking away from the demonstration.

The video was posted as a political ad, heading into next month’s elections, for the party’s new judicial overhaul agenda. The newly unveiled plan goes even farther than the extremely controversial package of changes proposed by the outgoing government, which hundreds of thousands of Israelis protested during weekly rallies throughout most of 2023.

Yashar leader Gadi Eisenkot, whose party is leading in polls ahead of the October 27 election, called the video “violent and despicable.”

“They haven’t learned a thing from October 7,” he said, accusing the far-right minister and his party of being “prepared to drag Israeli society into the abyss – again.”

In his post, the former IDF chief of staff said Smotrich “pretends to represent the sons and daughters of religious Zionism, but in practice tarnishes the good name of an entire sector [of Israeli society].”

“And all this in the Ten Days of Repentance,” he added, referring to the period between the holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, traditionally set........

© The Times of Israel