Judicial overhaul will boost economy, Netanyahu tells nervous entrepreneurs

• Published date: 27 January 2023

"Lifting the bureaucratic-judicial boot will jumpstart the Israeli economy like a spring, by somewhere between 1-2% of the GDP," he said

He spoke to the business community after two companies — Papaya Global and Disruptive Technologies Venture Capital — said they planned to pull out of Israel due to their concern regarding the negative financial impacts of the judicial reform.

"The independence of the court will be preserved in a system of checks and balances that exist in all countries. The reform won't harm the economy, it will boost it."

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

In combatting what has become a growing economic concern, Netanyahu has pulled on his historic role as the former Finance Minister in transforming Israel's economy from one based on social welfare to a free-market model closed to two decades ago.

Part of that drive included de-regularization to remove bureaucratic barriers that had hampered the economy.

Both at a press conference on Wednesday night and again with the business community on Friday morning he attempted to draw a parallel between his successful economic reform and the judicial overhaul his new government proposed.

He explained Israel's judiciary similarly suffers from excessive regulation.

"The problem of judicialization in Israel is a huge obstacle to the economy. The Israeli economic miracle is not due to judicialization but in spite of Israeli judicialization which is one of the worst in the western world," Netanyahu said.

The World Bank, he explained, had given Israel a global 75th ranking when it came to contract enforcement because a court can overturn it on the grounds that it is unreasonable, a possibility that does not exist in most democracies.

Israel's...