MK Shelly Yachimovich
MK Shelly YachimovichFlash 90

MK Shelly Yachimovich (Zionist Union) attacked Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked (Jewish Home) for an article in which she argued that Israel would strengthen its democracy by becoming more Jewish.

"The Justice Minister shows her deep-seated contempt for the state and its institutions in this article." Yachimovich said. "She considers the moral foundations and all types of normative life here to be corrupt, rotten, and unnecessary."

"She used variations of the word 'freedom' over thirty times, but she meant by that the freedom of the few and the powerful to do what they want, while the public is left to deal with corruption, theft, price gouging, and exploitation. This is incompatible with Zionism."

Yachimovich said that Shaked delegitimized the whole of Israeli society, from the Knesset to the Courts.

"Anyone who believes in that pointless idea that we should join the right-wing government should read this article and then they will understand the abyss that divides the Labor movement from the right-wing government on issues of political, economic, and social development."

Earlier this week Shaked published an article she termed a 'manifesto' in the HaShiloach journal. In it she explained her view that there is no conflict between Israel's Jewishness and its democratic character and that the two sides of Israel's identity reinforce each other.