Tel Aviv sees demonstration against Netanyahu government
Left-wing protesters single out the package of reforms put forward by Justice Minister Yariv Levin
Several thousand Israelis gathered in central Tel Aviv on Saturday to protest against the new government headed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The protesters brandished rainbow flags and banners decrying the coalition as "far-right" and calling for peace between Jews and Arabs. Numerous demonstrators were waving Israeli flags.
A few of the country's leftist lawmakers, including Labor party leader Merav Michaeli, gave speeches.
The package of reforms put forward by Justice Minister Yariv Levin — proposing to boost the power of elected officials over the courts — drew particular ire from protesters, some of whom charged that the measures amounted to a "coup d'état."
The new government led by Netanyahu — already Israel's longest-serving prime minister and its dominant political player in the past three decades — is regarded by many as the most right-wing in the country's 74-year history. It features such religious-nationalist hardliners as Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich.