UTJ Leader Gafni Hits Back at Anti-Government Protestors

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March 13, 2023, 6 PM ET

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Moshe Gafni, leader of the Degel HaTorah Party – a faction in the United Torah Judaism (UTJ) Ashkenazic Haredi party which is part of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s coalition government – went on the offensive against demonstrators who took their protests against his government’s judicial reform plan to him personally. On Sunday the protest organizers said they were going to protest outside his home in Bnei Brak. “You chose to protest in front of the wrong person,” said Gafni. “You will not move me a centimeter from the full support for passing the legal reform.” “Get used to it!!” he declared.

בחרתם להפגין מול האדם הלא נכון.
לא תזיזו אותי בסנטימטר מהתמיכה המלאה בהעברת הרפורמה המשפטית. תתרגלו!! — משה גפני Moshe Gafni (@Gafni_Moshe) March 13, 2023

Gafni also had a reply for people who have alleged that he is too quick to compromise. The UTJ leader tweeted about how when appearing at the National Energy Conference on legal reform he responded to people who told him that “I’m always trying to compromise,” by asking them in return, “Where were you when the Supreme Court ruled against me all the time for 74 years?” Update: Police have decided the demonstrations will not be held within a few hundreds of meters from Gafni's home, presumably out of fear that the local Haredi public won't be as docile towards the anarchist protesters as the average Israeli. Gafni has called on the public to not come to the Bnei Brak demonstration and to not fight with them there.