Netanyahu’s Power Grab: Is Israel Still a Democracy?

Now that he controls the court, is Bibi finally the dictator he wanted to be?

For decades, Israel has been hailed by Western leaders as the Middle East’s only democracy, regardless of how meaningless the statement actually is. But under the continued rule of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—now Israel’s longest-serving leader—critics are asking a sobering question: is that label still accurate?

The Netanyahu government has spent the past year dismantling the core institutional checks that define democratic governance. What began as a controversial judicial overhaul has snowballed into a sweeping consolidation of power, with implications far beyond legal bureaucracy.