No: we’re talking about a judicial branch that exists within an elective system of government. The logical extension of that is not dictatorship.
We can discard metaphysics: independent judiciaries strengthen democracy by limiting the ability of executive and legislative authorities to undermine their own mandate to govern.
Just because someone writes a paper complaining about the Polish government firing holdovers from a literal totalitarian regime, or noting that communist regimes usually gut all organs of government when they take over, you don't get to extrapolate to wildly different circumstances and say "thank god no one gets to vote on this, it would be Very Dangerous For Our Democracy."
Is it the perfect, ideal judicial selection process? Almost certainly not. But it’s not incestuous or unaccountable in the way you’re claiming.
This is arguably more accountable than the SCOTUS process in the US, where a hair-thin congressional majority can railroad a justice into office for their natural life.
Strengthens democracy != is itself democratic
Eg, the US requiring a supermajority for impeachment is antidemocratic (the minority decides), but it strengthens democracy (because it shouldn’t be done by one side alone).
This is a pretty core principle of democratic government
> Since 1953, Israel has selected its judges through a diverse committee composed of three Supreme Court justices, two government ministers, two members of the Knesset, and two members of the Israel Bar Association. To appoint a Supreme Court justice, a seven-vote majority of the nine-member committee is required, which means that no group can act alone. Judges can veto what the politicians want, and the politicians can veto what the judges want. This has led to a system of consensus-building and bargaining that produces judges who are for the most part perceived as centrists.
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/israel/end-israeli-democracy
Does that not apply to the Supreme Court, only other judiciary?
Which is why, ordinarily, we try and do justice to our and others’ understandings by not stopping at superficial analyses.
Judicial review has empirically strengthened democracies, rather than weakening them. Democracies that weaken or capture their independent judiciaries tend to undergo democratic backsliding, especially under reactionary governments.