Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Sunday called on the international community to boycott the Israeli government over its effort to reform the judiciary.
“I call on the United States to make a new assessment of relations with Israel for all that this implies. I call on world leaders not to meet with [Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu,” said Olmert in an interview with DemocraTV, according to Israel National News.
“[U.S. President Joe] Biden, if he loves Israel, must act against the government… to make it clear to the violent group that supports Netanyahu what the price that the State of Israel will pay for its actions [is],” added Olmert.
In February, Olmert urged the protest movement against the judicial reform initiative to move to the “next stage.”
“What is needed is to move to the next stage, the stage of war, and war is not waged with speeches. War is waged in a face-to-face battle, head-to-head and hand-to-hand, and that is what will happen here,” he told DemocraTV at the time.
“It’s good to see 100,000 people [in the streets], but that’s not what will lead the real fight. The real fight will break through these fences and enter into a real war,” Olmert continued.
Last year, Olmert was ordered to pay to Netanyahu, his wife Sara and son Yair just over $28,000—$18,000 in damages and the rest to cover legal costs—for calling them mentally ill.
“What is irreparable is the mental illness of the prime minister [Netanyahu], his wife and his son,” Olmert said in an interview with DemocraTV.
Olmert served as prime minister between 2006 and 2009, before being convicted of fraud in 2014 and serving 16 months of a 27-month prison sentence.
Produced in association with Jewish News Syndicate
(Additional reporting provided by JNS Reporter)
