The British media features wide coverage of yesterday’s Supreme Court hearing. The Financial Times covers the day’s events, while The Times’ Anshel Pfeffer writes of “the most fundamental clash between parliamentary and judicial powers in Israel’s history.”

The Guardian offers an explainer on Israel’s judicial crisis, and also covers the anti-reform protests accompanying the hearing. “Protesters gathered outside the court building in Jerusalem as the hearing began,” it writes; “banging drums, blowing whistles, chanting and waving Israeli flags. In the hundreds, they were later joined by several dozen rightwing activists, who shouted ‘the people are the sovereign’ and held signs declaring they had voted for the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and not the supreme court’s chief justice, Esther Hayut.”

The Independent focusses on the prominent security and military figures speaking out against the judicial reforms. “More than 180 former senior officials from the Mossad, the Shin Bet domestic security agency, the military and the police have united against steps they say will shatter Israel’s resilience in the face of mounting threats from the West Bank, Lebanon and Iran,” it writes. “‘We were used to dealing with external threats,’ said Tamir Pardo, a former head of Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency… ‘We’ve been through wars, through military operations and all of a sudden you realize that the greatest threat to the state of Israel is internal.’” Similarly, “‘We are the people who were there, who fought all the wars,’ said Noam Tibon, a retired military major general. ‘We decided there needs to be a strong, ethical and clear voice that calls for and works to stop the process of destruction of the country.’”

Away from the debate over judicial reform, The Economist and The BBC mark the 30^th anniversary of the Oslo Accords. Reflecting on the dissipation of the hope which accompanied the process, the latter writes that “while opinion polls indicated the Oslo Accords were originally supported by two-thirds of the Palestinian public, the huge optimism it generated has been replaced by deep gloom. ‘It’s just an overwhelming perception that the Palestinian leadership made a huge mistake some 30 years ago,’ says veteran Palestinian pollster, Khalil Shikaki. ‘The belief that the two-state solution is no longer viable is also overwhelming, and that is making people a lot more depressed.’”

The Israeli media is dominated by coverage and analysis of yesterday’s Supreme Court hearing. Yediot Ahronot’s Nahum Barnea wrote that “usually, the comments made by judges in court don’t say much about the ruling that they will write. Not this time. The marathon hearing in the Supreme Court yesterday provided the judges with an opportunity to tell the public what they think about their power and standing, and what they think about the regime in Israel and the dangers that lie in wait for it. The two ideological camps in the court were publicly displayed. The show was provided by two MKs and the prime minister’s learned representative, but the discussion that the judges held over the heads of the petitioners and the respondents was far more important and far more dignified than the performance that was put on by the government’s representatives.”

Barnea’s Yediot Ahronot colleague Sima Kadmon focusses on the testimony of MK Simcha Rothman, saying “I don’t think anyone has ever had the gall to make accusations against the judges like the ones he made yesterday… It was a breathtaking spectacle when Rothman [tried to] give a lesson in democracy to the 15 Supreme Court justices, each one of whom has at least 30 years’ experience and… a cumulative total of 450 years on the bench.”

Israel Hayom’s Ariel Kahana notes that “Supreme Court President Esther Hayut made a wise decision when she allowed the general public to watch yesterday’s deliberations via live broadcast, and when she decided that the panel hearing the unprecedented petitions to strike down a basic law passed by the Knesset would be heard by a panel of all 15 justices. Those two decisions show a desire, at least on her part, to demonstrate a connection to the public and [the court’s] attentiveness to the harsh criticism emanating from [the public]. But the long day of deliberations exposed the wide chasm between the sides. Because everyone was speaking in Hebrew legalese, but the languages and the outlooks were as distant from one another as heaven and earth.”

Maariv’s Ben Caspit focussed on the prominence given by the hearing to different interpretations of the importance of Israel’s Declaration of Independence. “The battle being fought at present in Israel between two rival camps,” he writes, “isn’t a battle between right and left, religious and secular or Arabs and Jews. The battle being fought is between those who hold the Declaration of Independence to be sacrosanct and those who repudiate it. Between those who believe that Israeli democracy derives its formative values from the Declaration of Independence and those who believe that that declaration might be a lovely document, but one that lacks any real validity… That is the entire story in a nutshell. For 75 years, every letter, sentence, comma and period in that declaration were imprinted on every Zionist’s heart. The declaration was also well-known around the world, in many different languages. The foundations of Israeli democracy rest on it. But now that doesn’t work for the government.”

Haaretz’s editorial argues that “in today’s insane conditions, when the coalition is running like an angry herd and heading toward a head-on collision with the court, it is imperative to praise those who dare take a stand and say what is no longer a given for far too many in Israel. Ministers Yoav Gallant, Gila Gamliel and Moshe Arbel declared that they’d respect the High Court ruling.” It further calls on other ministers to “understand that they’re members of a government that is openly questioning the Declaration of Independence, its values, its legal and constitutional standing, and its spirit. If the coalition’s threats come to fruition, and Israel heads toward a clash between those guided by the Declaration of Independence versus those fighting for the government’s right to behave unreasonably, they would do very well to reconsider their place in this government.”

Ynet reports UK Foreign Secretary James Cleverly’s visit to Israel. After arriving on Monday, Cleverly met with Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Eli Cohen before visiting Yad Vashem and laying a wreath in the Hall of Remembrance. During their meeting, Netanyahu emphasised the importance of preventing Iran’s nuclear ambitions and the need to halt Iran’s undermining of regional and global stability. The two also discussed increasing bilateral cooperation in security, technology, and economic fields, especially in artificial intelligence. Also in attendance were Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, National Security Advisor Tzachi Hanegbi, and other security officials. Of their separate meeting, Cohen said “Britain is our largest trading partner in Europe. I asked my friend, Foreign Secretary Cleverly, to work towards advancing a free trade agreement between our countries for the benefit of both nations’ prosperity.” Cohen also said that the bilateral relationship was currently at a historic peak. Cleverly continued on to the West Bank yesterday to meet with Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh.

Channel 12 details meetings held in the last few days between Assistant US Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Barbara Leaf and former Israeli prime ministers Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid and former defence minister Benny Gantz. The topic of discussion was the potential normalisation deal with Saudi Arabia, and “according to two informed sources, the meetings were held in order to allow the Americans to get a sense of where the boundaries in the Israeli political arena lie—not only the boundaries that are being drawn by the incumbent government, but the boundaries that people who held the reins of power in not too-distant past believe should be observed.”

Kan News reports that two Israeli civilians were moderately wounded in a shooting attack in the West Bank village of Huwara yesterday. The IDF is searching for the gunman. I24 News, meanwhile, reports that Israeli forces arrested 13 terror suspects in the West Bank overnight in an operation carried out jointly by the IDF, Shin Bet, and the Security Guard. Arrests took place in several villages, including Gilkamos, Bla’in, Araba, Kabatia, Aram, as well as in the cities of Hebron and Kalkilia. Despite coming under attack from stones and Molotov cocktails, no injuries were sustained by Israeli personnel.