Tens of thousands of Israelis protest against Netanyahu's judicial overhaul

Critics of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu-led government have continued their protests in Israel, with thousands turning out in Tel Aviv and other cities to oppose the controversial judicial reform plan that aims to give politicians more control over the Supreme Court.

Demonstrators on Saturday also observed a minute of silence for those killed on Friday in occupied West Bank.

A gunman killed seven people and wounded three others in Neve Yaakov, an illegal Jewish settler neighbourhood of Israeli-annexed Palestinian territory.

The attack heightened fears of a spiral in bloodshed, a day after the Israeli raid in the West Bank left 10 Palestinians dead. 

Thousands gathered near the President Isaac Herzog's house in Jerusalem to protest the government's judicial overhaul, Haaretz reported. 

The plans have sparked fierce debate in Israel, prompting large weekly demonstrations in Tel Aviv and other cities with more than 100,000 protesters attending last week's demonstration.

Threat to democracy 

The plans, which the government says are needed to curb overreach by activist judges, have drawn fierce opposition from groups including lawyers, and raised concerns among business leaders, widening already deep political divisions in Israeli society.

Netanyahu has dismissed the protests, now in their fourth week, as a refusal by leftist opponents to accept the results of last November's election, which produced one of the most right-wing governments in Israel's history.

The protesters say the future of Israeli democracy is at stake if the plans, which would tighten government control over judicial appointments and limit the Supreme Court's powers to review government decisions, go through.

As well as threatening the independence of judges and weakening oversight of the government and parliament, they say the plans will undermine the rights of minorities and open the door to more corruption.