Some 130 demonstrators, including residents of South Tel Aviv and their supporters, on Saturday night stood in front of the home of recently appointed Supreme Court President Esther Hayut in Tel Aviv and called on her not to interfere in the government’s attempts to get rid of illegal aliens in Israel (see: Cabinet Votes Unanimously to Shut Down Illegal Alien Detention Facility).
One activist, Shefi Paz, leader of the South Tel Aviv Liberation Front, was arrested during the rally and later released, on condition that she remain outside the luxury neighborhood of Tzahala in northeastern Tel Aviv.
Matan Peleg, chairman of the Im Tirtzu movement, noted that this was the eleventh such rally, intended to remind all the Supreme Court justices that “the citizens of the state are not transparent and they, too, have human and civil rights.”
The previous ten rallies against the policy of the High Court of Justice to prevent a firm treatment of some 50,000 African illegal migrants were held in front of now retired court president Miriam Naor.
“The Israeli government has begun a blessed process in which the Holot facility will be closed forthwith,” Peleg said, suggesting “the time has come for the High Court of Justice’s tyranny to come to an end.”
The rally was held against the backdrop of a government plan to close the Holot detention facility near the Egyptian border and enforce a policy of returning the migrants home in short order.
At the rally, Paz said that “the State of Israel did not ask us for permission to dump on us tens of thousands of infiltrators, and we do not ask her permission to demonstrate against symbols of government or any other person or institution.” She called on Esther Hayut to “put an end to the African ghetto that was built on the ruins of our lives.”