Justice Minister Yariv Levin responded to the claims made over the weekend by retired Supreme Court President Judge Aharon Barak.
"He brought a tragedy upon Israel, and his ways contradict democracy. According to him, the judges trump the nation's elected officials who are supposed to reflect what the public wants," the minister told Kan 11. "Where was Barak when the court took authority and trampled democracy? His suggestions for dialogue are just a way to stall for time," he added.
"We all know how the courts look, the red tape. We all experienced the unbearable bureaucracy, which no government figure wants to take responsibility for and do something about because they receive a desist order and some other order from the court."
Barak told Kan 11 on Saturday, "Minister Levin collected all the bad proposals that were made over the years and connected them together into some kind of chain that is suffocating Israeli democracy," said Barak.
He added that "there is no greater evil than this as a constitutional revolution, the most parallel thing to this is a revolution of tanks."
In an interview with Channel 13 News on Saturday, the retired judge said: "The ones that will be harmed first and foremost will be each and every individual - their rights, their honor, their lives, their bodies, their property, their freedom, their movement, their daily lives."
"What has changed is the plan that Justice Minister MK Yariv Levin presented. In the clearest, sharpest, and fiercest way, I think that there is a clear and tangible threat to Israel's democracy. If these plans come to fruition, we will have a formal government, an unchecked government. In practice, we will only one branch of government: the prime minister, since the court will not fulfill the regular functions that it fulfills in a democratic society," he continued.
"To prevent an empty government, we need to support it from different sides. That is that someone comes and tells the Knesset: 'up to here'. Right, we don't have a formal constitution, but there are basic laws that the Declaration of Independence recognizes."