President Biden himself had previously and explicitly called on Netanyahu to 'walk away' from the plan in favor of pursuing a broad consensus which reflects the overhaul's deep unpopularity in the U.S.
WASHINGTON – Outgoing U.S. Ambassador to Israel Tom Nides on Monday said that the Biden administration spoke out against Israel’s planned judicial overhaul, warning that “things are going off the rails.”
In an exit interview with the Wall Street Journal, Nides said that he urged Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to slow the process and seek consensus during the spring amid ongoing widespread protests. This is despite the relative lack of precedent for a U.S. administration to involve itself in domestic Israeli matters.
Biden himself had previously and explicitly called on Netanyahu to “walk away” from the plan in favor of pursuing a broad consensus which reflects the overhaul’s deep unpopularity with U.S. lawmakers and the vast majority of the U.S. Jewish community.
“I think most Israelis want the United States to be in their business,” Nides told the Journal. “With that sometimes comes a modicum of a price, which is articulating when we think things are going off the rails.”
The ambassador further told the Journal that the Biden administration’s primary issue was the Netanyahu government “rushing things through that ultimately could have huge implications, at least perception-wise, about what makes Israel great.” The Journal said Nides clarified he meant Israel’s democratic institutions, which U.S. officials often tout when defending Israel in international forums.
Nides’ comments come weeks after he said he doesn’t believe Netanyahu would unilaterally push the legislation through. “His coalition partners have a different objective, but I think he himself wants to do big things,” he told the Jewish Democratic Council of America, highlighting Iran and Saudi Arabia. “My hope is they will not do everything unilaterally. Because I think the reaction here would be quite dramatic.”
His comments mirror similar warnings from U.S. President Joe Biden, who noted that Netanyahu “is trying to work through how we can work through his existing problems in terms of his coalition,” which he described as the most extreme Israeli government in his decades in politics.
Despite this, Israel’s coalition is set to advance a key bill that will abolish Israel’s reasonableness standard, which would stop the Supreme Court from overturning legislation it deems unreasonable. Organizations that are protesting the legislation and the rest of the government’s judicial overhaul said that if the bill passed its first reading on Monday, they plan a nationwide day of disruption for Tuesday.