Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi spoke with Israel's Meet the Press on Saturday and stated that he would cut hundreds of millions of shekels from the Public Broadcasting Corporation.
"There's no place for public broadcasting in Israel," Karhi stated in the interview. "We will take down barriers and open the market to competition. I hope that it will enter the economic arrangements law soon. The Public Broadcasting Corporation's budget will be cut by hundreds of millions. We will take those hundreds of millions that today go to one player on the market (the Public Broadcasting Corporation) and split them up properly."
Amid the anti-government demonstrations on Saturday evening, the minister also discussed the planned judicial reform: "The reform is a compromise. I am not ready to compromise the 61 MK override clause. I am open to any change that will leave the elected officials as those who decide. The elected officials must have the final say.
When the public went to the polls, it knew. At every conference, we spoke about it. Do you know what affirmative action is? The opposition holds 100% of the Supreme Court. But the judges should decide, Karhi stated. He added: "Journalists want to appease their base; I want them to appease the public."
The Journalist's Organization, the representative organization of journalists of the Broadcasting Corporation, condemned the Minister of Communications, Shlomo Karhi, stating, "Minister Karhi's statement that he intends to cut the budget of the Public Broadcasting Corporation by hundreds of millions is a declaration of war on public broadcasting. Public broadcasting in a democratic society enables high-quality broadcasts of social and cultural value, which do not depend on those with money and interests and solely on commercial considerations."