Israel's cabinet voted unanimously on Sunday to reject a ruling by the High Court of Justice about the Second Authority for Television and Radio, Israel's commercial broadcast regulator. The court had ordered the council to keep functioning despite falling below the two-thirds quorum required by the 1990 law establishing it, saying the vacancies resulted from "deliberate obstruction and paralysis" by Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi. No Israeli government has ever openly refused to comply with a Supreme Court ruling before. Israel has national elections scheduled for October.

1. The Government Says the Court Invented Its Own Authority (Netanyahu's Coalition, Justice Minister Yariv Levin)

The cabinet says it isn't defying the law — it's defending it against a court that rewrote an explicit statute.

The 1990 law says two-thirds. The court said ignore it. Justice Minister Yariv Levin argued the cabinet had to refuse: "High Court judges are not the Knesset, and a fit of power does not grant authority to erase an explicit threshold condition from the law." The government's formal statement said "a ruling that contradicts the law will not be recognised."

The government frames this as returning power to the people. Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi called the vote "a historic step to return the Jewish and democratic State of the Jews to its owners — the people." He added: "The rule of law is not the rule of judges." Cabinet Secretary Yossi Fuchs sought to soften the move, saying the government would use "all legal tools at its disposal to overturn the decision" through proper channels rather than simply ignoring it.

2. But the Opposition Says This Kills Rule of Law (Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara, Yair Lapid, Naftali Bennett)

Every major legal institution in Israel has condemned it. The scarier warning is about what happens after October.

This kills the rule of law, Israel's attorney general says. President Isaac Herzog called it "a red line that must not be crossed under any circumstances." All living former presidents of the Supreme Court condemned the move and warned it would end Israeli democracy. Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara said the decision "undermines the fundamental principles of the rule of law." Opposition leader Yair Lapid called it "the most serious constitutional crisis in Israel's history."

The real fear is what happens after October's election. Democrats leader Yair Golan warned that Netanyahu's government "knows it has no chance of winning an election, and therefore it is waging war on the rule of law." Golan said the goal is to "refuse tomorrow to accept the election results and vacate power after it is defeated at the polls." Former PM Naftali Bennett put it simply: "Disobedience to a court ruling brings anarchy to the streets and the dismantling of our state."

3. And There's a TV Sale at the Center of This (Israel's Union of Journalists, Haaretz)

The channel at stake is one of Netanyahu's loudest critics — and the court found the quorum collapse wasn't an accident.

The quorum collapse was deliberate, the court found. The court accused Communications Minister Karhi of engineering the council's quorum collapse specifically to block the Channel 13 sale. Channel 13 (Reshet 13) is one of Israel's main commercial broadcasters and a frequent Netanyahu critic. Its owner, Len Blavatnik, signed a deal in March 2026 to sell it to a consortium led by Wiz co-founder Assaf Rappaport. Blavatnik rejected a competing offer from Patrick Drahi, owner of i24 News and a Netanyahu ally. The regulator needs a quorum to approve the sale.

The government is blocking Channel 13's sale. Israel's Union of Journalists said the government was "dismantling the media and democracy" and blocking the sale for political reasons. Haaretz called the deal "a victory for Israel's free press." With elections months away, keeping the regulator paralyzed prevents Channel 13 from completing the sale to independent owners. It could also force the deal to collapse entirely.

Where This Lands

Netanyahu's coalition insists it's defending the plain text of Israeli law, not defying democracy. The 1990 statute sets a two-thirds quorum, and the coalition says the court exceeded its authority by overriding it. The attorney general, every former Supreme Court chief justice, and most of the opposition say a government that picks which rulings to obey has ended the rule of law. The deeper fear is what happens if Netanyahu loses in October — after having already normalized ignoring courts. Both camps are also fighting over something concrete: whether Channel 13, Israel's most prominent critical broadcaster, survives in independent hands before Election Day.

Sources