Israeli government's attack on the judiciary is a warning from history - opinion

But the method is not new at all. It was born with the near-parallel collapse of fragile democracies in Italy and Germany about a hundred years ago, in favor of fascist regimes that rose on their ruins. Since then it has been replicated again and again: Viktor Orbán, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and Vladimir Putin all learned the same pattern of delegitimizing state institutions, inciting against courts, and cultivating permanent states of emergency as a path to absolute power, while regimes spread lies and poison by every means available to their era – once radio, today social media and planted media mouthpieces.

In post-World War I Italy, Benito Mussolini – arguably the true pioneer of the genre – scorned parliament as “chatter” and portrayed courts and civil servants as hostile elites preventing “national revival.” The press normalized Blackshirt violence as “restoring order,” and emergency laws were framed as temporary and necessary. He rose to power in 1922 and ended up hanging 23 years later, after a period filled with disaster and suffering for the Italian people.

In Germany, the Weimar Republic was a fragile democracy that arose after centuries of empire and centralized monarchy. Weimar was unusually liberal for its time: freedom of expression and association, equality before the law, judicial independence, and broad civil rights. But it was born out of defeat and national humiliation – and enemies of democracy learned well from Mussolini.

Regimes survive on a sense of legitimacy – a broad belief that rights are real, and that neutral arbiters (judges, courts, civil servants) protect everyone’s rights rather than the political interest of a particular faction or person. Propaganda must neutralize this by sowing cynicism.

Equally important is a timid media that normalizes attacks on democracy – presenting “both sides” even when one is fact and the other fiction. Such media sacrifices truth on the altar of neutrality. When “everyone lies,” liars thrive. When “everyone is corrupt,” professional corruption flourishes. When “everyone is guilty,” the guilty walk free. When “everyone must be investigated,” there is no real investigation. Cynicism always serves the miscreant.

In Germany, there was the “stab-in-the-back theory” – the myth that the country had not truly been militarily defeated in World War I but betrayed from within by liberals, socialists, and Jews. This dangerous lie was elevated into a legitimate narrative. It would be roughly equivalent to taking seriously claims that Israel’s internal security service “helped” the October 7 attacks. Imagine such a thing!

In Israel, there is now an attempt to carry out a revolution in judicial nominations. In Weimar there was less need for this, because judges were largely recruited from the imperial civil service: conservative, monarchist, and suspicious of parliamentarism. From this emerged extreme leniency toward violence against democracy, which led to an international catastrophe.

The most striking example is the 1923 “Beer Hall Putsch” – a failed coup attempt that should have politically destroyed its leader, Adolf Hitler. Instead, the court treated Hitler and his accomplices with extraordinary leniency, and he served less than a year in prison. From the witness stand, Hitler turned the trial into a propaganda stage (sound familiar?), while the judge expressed admiration. All this while the Right still mocked judges as “elites” – because regardless of the truth, it was useful.

When Germany began suspending basic rights, it did so through emergency decrees – encouraging the creation, or at least declaration, of constant emergencies. Today’s cabal – from President Donald Trump to Netanyahu – learned the method well. Trump arrogated to himself the right to disrupt the global economy through draconian and random tariffs (normally the domain of Congress) on the false claim that all international trade is essentially an emergency.

When Hitler finally became chancellor in 1933, the institutions that might have resisted him had already been weakened. Civil rights were soon suspended. Freedom of speech, of the press, and of assembly, and protection against arbitrary arrest, were all abolished. “Preventive detention” allowed imprisonment without time limit, trial, lawyer, or indictment. Remaining liberal judges were purged or required to swear loyalty to the chancellor instead of the constitution. Special courts for “treason” were created with near-certain conviction rates. Equality before the law was formally abolished. Civil rights vanished.

Those who said it could not happen were proven wrong. Those who did not understand what loss of civil rights meant learned quickly. Those who wanted a strong leader got monstrous madness. How it ended, everyone knows.

And today? In Turkey over the past decade, emergency powers declared after terror attacks were used to purge judges, journalists, academics, and civil servants. The media now largely reports Erdogan’s narrative.

In Hungary, constitutional amendments and new laws have gradually weakened judicial independence, reshaped election laws, and pressured media outlets. In Poland, “reforms” by the conservative-right Law and Justice Party placed courts under greater political influence, shortened judicial terms, created disciplinary mechanisms for judges, and altered appointment procedures to favor party loyalists.

In Russia under Putin, the same method produced a full dictatorship. A similar trajectory unfolded in Venezuela: Hugo Chávez and his successor Nicolás Maduro concentrated power in the executive via emergency decrees, while a loyalist Supreme Court neutralized all opposition and in 2024 helped steal elections.