‘Let Me Answer’: Netanyahu Fumes at CNN’s Wolf Blitzer During Heated Exchange on Israel’s Judicial Overhaul

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer got in a tense exchange during an interview about the recent judicial overhaul that has caused widespread protests across the country.

A new law passed by Netanyahu’s government this week would effectively end judicial review in the country and has been denounced by critics as a “judicial coup.” The law, which is currently facing legal challenges, sparked protests across Israel as even Israeli army reservists refuse to serve the current government.

Blitzer confronted Netanyahu, who has served in Israel’s government for decades, about the new controversial judicial overhaul, and things became heated when the prime minister accused the host of not letting him finish his answer.

“In Israel, we have the Supreme Court has a lot of checks, but there are no balances,” Netanyahu told Blitzer, noting it’s not democratic for the court to block appointments without providing specific reasoning. “But just by saying we don’t think this appointment is reasonable. That doesn’t exist in America. It doesn’t exist in most democracies, not to the scope. And that’s the minor correction that we made that is now called the end of democracy. If that’s the end of democracy, there are no democracies because none of them have this.”

Blitzer interrupted Netanyahu to note that the comparison to the United States system of checks and balances is not accurate:

BLITZER: Let me just point out Mr. Prime Minister that the U.S. has a lot more checks and balances.

NETANYAHU: Wolf, please you’re asking me to come here-

BLITZER: And as you know, what’s so disturbing is that thousands of Israeli military reservists are protesting, including pilots they’re refusing to serve. Right now, that’s emboldening Israel’s adversaries like Iran. They’re watching. Is Israel less safe today because of what you’re doing?

NETANYAHU: Well, I’ll answer it if you’ll let me answer your questions. If you just want to hear yourself, go ahead. But you want to hear my answer. Let me answer. Israel has a very strong military. It has a very strong military. It is able to deal with all the challenges that we have and we have many. But I want to tell you one thing. You speak of a few thousand who express their reservations, their opposition. Israel has an army of hundreds of thousands with reservists. We have close to 100,000, 100,000 people who signed a petition to say that we support the current actions of the government. You didn’t hear a word about it. We had a quarter of a million people the other day in Tel Aviv supporting the government.

Watch the full clip above via CNN.

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