Likud MK withdraws bill reducing AG's powers

Times of Israel reports that n Wednesday, Likud MK Eli Dallal’s bill, dealing with the highly sensitive topic of the attorney general’s powers, was advanced through a preliminary bureaucratic step in the Knesset, leading to it being published on the Knesset website.

Dallal said on Thursday that he will withdraw his controversial bill to split the position of the attorney general, saying he had never meant to advance it in the current Knesset.

The publication coincided closely with the knesset approval of the law to reduce the reasonability standard, and Drew widespread condemnation from the opposition as being part of a rapid attempt to move forward with removing judicial oversight on government actions.

Dallal denied responsibility for the bill getting approved this week, insisting that the Knesset legal department was responsible for the timing, not MKs or the coalition as a whole.

“I very much hope that we will know good and united days and that we will come to broad agreement on everything connected to the required balance between the branches of government,” he adds.

“There is no intention to advance it or any other law connected to the legal system,” wrote Dallal, adding that the bill, if passed into law, would only take effect in the next Knesset, meaning after new elections.

The Likud party, including the Prime Minister's office, disowned the bill as well: “Bills such as these will not be advanced without the approval of coalition heads, and therefore it is not on the agenda,” Likud said in a statement. Despite this, all 10 MKs who originally co-signed the bill will need to agree for it to be formally withdrawn.