Aharon Barak on the Violence at Solberg's Home: 'It's Not All Netanyahu, But In the End It All Leads to Him'
Former Supreme Court president Aharon Barak commented today (Thursday) in an exclusive interview on “Glik and Tamar” on Kan 11 on the violent protest against the draft law outside the home of Supreme Court Deputy President Justice Noam Solberg, which took place last night. “I think about the thuggish behavior of people who not only break the law but also violate Jewish law, people we call ultra-Orthodox, but who do not have fear of God in their hearts,” the retired judge said about the protest. Asked whether such events frighten him, he replied: “I assume that Noam Solberg and Mira, his dear wife, are frightened by it. It no longer frightens me, because I am used to such thuggish behavior.”
Barak added that the protest outside Solberg’s home was not “a regular protest. A regular protest is certainly legal, and everyone has the right to demonstrate. But this is not a regular protest. This is a criminal offense. It is directed at the home of a judge in Israel, and not just his home, but his ruling, it is meant to influence his judgment.” Barak is certain that Solberg “will not be influenced by it. But it makes judicial work unnatural. Suddenly you have to take into account background noise that interferes with normal judicial activity. Judicial work requires calm, quiet, and concentration on the legal side while neutralizing background noise, and suddenly the background noise enters the picture.”
Barak also referred to the blocking of his car by right-wing activist Mordechai David: “You get used to one trouble and wait for the worse one. I was not afraid (when it happened to me). As my mother used to say, ‘If we survived Hitler, we will survive this too.’” In his words, “We must not accept this thuggery, it is against the law.”
Barak was asked who he thinks is responsible for this situation, and he replied: “It is hard to know. Every thug has his own background. It does not begin with the ultra-Orthodox and it does not end with the ultra-Orthodox. It begins with the man who blocked my car, and continues with those who riot in the courtroom.” According to him, “Not everything is Netanyahu, but in the end everything also leads to him. Because he did not condemn the thuggery against me, for example. I am glad that in the thuggery against Noam Solberg he did say that it was not right and that action must be taken against it within the law. I hope this time it will help.”
At the end of the interview he said: “Once you feel free to act with verbal thuggery in a courtroom, then you can also act with verbal violence toward the judge, and verbal violence quickly becomes physical violence, against his property, against his home, and against the judge himself.”
Last night, about 50 ultra-Orthodox demonstrators were arrested on suspicion of damaging Solberg’s car and home in Alon Shvut. The violent protest drew a series of condemnations from the political system, including from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who wrote on X: “Law enforcement authorities must exact the full severity of the law from the rioters,” and later spoke with Solberg. President Isaac Herzog, who also spoke with Solberg, said: “Incitement, threats and harm to the home of a judge in Israel are not protest, they are a dangerous red line crossed. Anyone who tries to intimidate the justice system harms not only a person, but the foundations of Israeli democracy. However deep the disagreement may be, it cannot turn into violence and intimidation.”
