High Court: Enforcing social distancing at protests is illegal
Social-distancing restrictions enforced at protests by the Israel Police during the coronavirus pandemic are illegal, and fines given to protesters in that context are nullified, effective immediately, the High Court of Justice ruled on Sunday.
The verdict came after several appeals by the Movement for Quality Government in Israel against an emergency bill that allowed restricting protests as part of the effort to limit the spread of the coronavirus.
The Knesset approved an amendment in September that allowed the government to impose a one-kilometer restriction on movement, thereby limiting the ability of citizens to organize and attend protests.
In October, the High Court asked the state to justify the amendment.
The one-kilometer restriction was approved while protests against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were at their peak. That led some people, including Supreme Court Justice Menachem Mazuz, to wonder whether the prime minster was involved in a conflict of interest by imposing limitations on protests against him.
“We’ve noticed that limitations on protests are imposed whenever a very specific protest is directed against the prime minister, and declaring a state of emergency has a direct impact on the protests against him,” Mazuz said at the time.
The High Court’s decision was a “great victory for the freedom of expression and protest,” Meretz Party leader Tamar Zandberg said. “No democracy can use the law to silence the voice of its people. When a prime minister is busy worrying day and night about suppressing the protests against him during such a harsh crisis, that’s not showing concern for the public’s health, but rather is silencing its voice.”