Israel adopts controversial Jewish 'nation state' law
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Israelis hold placards reading: ‘This house belongs to all of us,’ during a protest against the controversial ‘nation state’ law.
Abir Sultan/EPA
Israel has passed a law declaring that only Jews have the right of self-determination in the country, a move described by members of the Arab minority as racist and verging on apartheid.
The “nation state” law, backed by the rightwing government, passed by a vote of 62-55 and two abstentions in the 120-member parliament after months of political argument. Some Arab MPs shouted and ripped up papers after the vote.
“This is a defining moment in the annals of Zionism and the history of the state of Israel,” the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, told the Knesset after the vote.
Largely symbolic, the law was enacted just after the 70th anniversary of the birth of the state of Israel. It stipulates that “Israel is the historic homeland of the Jewish people and they have an exclusive right to national self-determination in it”.
The bill strips Arabic of its designation as an official language alongside Hebrew, downgrading it to a “special status” that enables its continued use within Israeli institutions.
There are 1.8 million Arabs in Israel, about 20% of the 9 million population.
Early drafts of the legislation went further in what critics at home and abroad saw as discrimination towards Israel’s Arabs, who have long said they are treated as second-class citizens.
Clauses that were dropped in last-minute political wrangling – and after objections by Israel’s president and attorney general – would have enshrined in law the establishment of Jewish-only communities, and instructed courts to rule according to Jewish ritual law when there were no relevant legal precedents.
Instead, a more vaguely worded version was approved, which says: “The state views the development of Jewish settlement as a national value and will act to encourage and promote its establishment.“
Even after the changes, critics said the law would deepen a sense of alienation within the Arab minority. “I announce with shock and sorrow the death of democracy,” said Ahmed Tibi, an Arab MP.
Netanyahu has defended the law. “We will keep ensuring civil rights in Israel’s democracy but the majority also has rights and the majority decides,” he said last week. “An absolute majority wants to ensure our state’s Jewish character for generations to come.“
Israel’s Arab population is comprised mainly of descendants of the Palestinians who remained on their land during the conflict between Arabs and Jews that culminated in the war of 1948 surrounding the creation of the modern state of Israel. Hundreds of thousands of people were forced to leave their homes or fled.
Those who remained have full equal rights under the law but say they face constant discrimination, citing inferior services and unfair allocations for education, health and housing.
In Ma’alot-Tarshiha, a municipality in northern Israel that was created by linking the Jewish town of Ma’alot and the Arab town of Tarshiha, there was anger among Arab residents.
“I think this is racist legislation by a radical rightwing government that is creating radical laws and is planting the seeds to create an apartheid state,” said Bassam Bisharah, 71, a doctor.
Adalah, the Legal Centre for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, called the law an attempt to advance “ethnic superiority by promoting racist policies”.
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This is a terrible mistake.
Until now, all those "apartheid" comments about Israel were nonsense.
Now Israel has made them true.
Arabs have no legal or historical claims on Israel. They are free to leave if they don't agree with this common sense solution.
Had the amended version not been accepted I would agree that it would have been a step towards Apartheid, but for that very reason it was amended before it was passed. Israel was intended to be a Jewish State, a home for the Jews, at least back as far as the Balfour Declaration, as you well know.
By the way, the Avatar image you posted with this article is DISGUSTING.
OMFG
I guess that's a little different than the Electoral College method wherein the majority does NOT decide, which is something I believe you have been upset about in America. Seems to me you prefer that the majority should have ruled in the Presidential election - or are you changing your tune because after all, it's Israel?
Having a majority vote select a governmental leader is not the same as having a majority vote determine what rights people have within a society.
You mean you don't believe that to pass legislation a majority vote of the government is required? Do the laws that affect the rights of the citizens of America not require to be passed by a majority vote?
Any laws of the US have to pass the test of the amendments to the US constitution that guarantee individual rights. Some of the most famous supreme court cases were related to the rights of people under the constitution. Netanyahu acts like the granting of individual rights is up to the majority. It may be like that in Israel and that would be too bad.
We give them almost 10 billion a year, we have every right to interfere. Besides, you sure didn't have a problem with Russia doing it to us.
I didn't say we "get to", but we should.
It would be nice to get our moneys worth
I'm one who thinks we could get a lot more for our money
Hell NO!
I've always been a supporter of Israel, but this is a huge mistake, IMO.
Why? It hasn't changed "Those [Arabs] who remained have full equal rights under the law"
Ever since the Balfour Declaration Israel was always intended to be a Jewish Nation - a home for the Jews. This legislation does not change that.
Buzz, I am going to have to agree with both Bob and Kavika, here. It's the message that it means to send.
And honestly, since the right has been there, they are making rules against Jews who are not orthodox. They do not recognize the other denominations, and I feel like this is part and parcel of the what has been going on.
It's the general trend that I don't care for, for a country where most people are still secular.
You do realize the Balfour Declaration was made by Britain? Signed by a legal body that soon went defunct (League of Nations). Kind of like the Sykes/Picot Agreement- who the hell gave these assholes the right to dictate anyone? Outside of the US abdicating our responsibility to reign in our allies when they are behaving like complete and utter morons that is.
Anyone that has studied history knows these idiots divided up people into countries based on resources- the spoils of which went to France and Britain- and not based on clans, tribes, religion, or anything else that would have made sense.
I know the claim there was never a Palestine; but it is named such in the Balfour Declaration. If that is the document you are using that the Zionist claim is legitimate; then you have to recognize Palestine does exist.
Also you left out an important part of the declaration:
They really botched the part in bold.
I am as unhappy about that as you are, and you are one of the very few who know why I feel that way, but what in that legislation says that the Orthodox rule?
Israeli police detained on Thursday a Conservative rabbi who presided over non-Orthodox weddings.
Rabbi Dov Haiyun of Moriah Congregation in Haifa was ordained by the Conservative movement, which is not recognized by Israel's Chief Rabbinate. He was detained following a complaint filed against him by the Rabbinical Court in Haifa for allegedly "marrying those who are not eligible to be married."
The incident was the first time police attempted to enforce a 2013 law forbidding performing weddings outside the Rabbinate, a law carrying a sentence of up to two years in prison.
Now normally I don't like Haaretz, but they are the right about this one
I agree with you - except that the law is the law and if you want to break the law you will suffer the consequences.
As for Ha'aretz, anything that will bash Israel is its bread and butter. However it has also been reported in the Jerusalem Post, wherein the article provides lots of examples of international outrage. However, how does this relate to the new legislation?
Buzz,
You are missing my point. That law is wrong and is bigoted to other jews and that is what this administration has done. Yes Haaratz is not what I would call Israel friendly, but even a broken clock is right twice a day and they are right in this matter. You asked for the law, and I showed it to you. This government is catering to the ultra right and not most of the people of Israel. This was not brought to vote to the people of Israel, it was legislated. Furthermore, it does nothing more than antagonize and make them grief when finally, things were beginning to go their way on the world scene.
Okay, I can't disagree with you. I guess it would cause a similar eruption in Canada if the government were to reduce the French language to no longer be one of the official two languages, and indicated that is still had official status.
deleted. "Your a friggin racist if you "Want" for your own countries "Legal" citizens.
One deserves a "Noble (everyone gets a trophy) Prize" for wanting for everyone else but.
Are you saying that Arab Israelis and the non-Orthodox aren't Israeli citizens?
You certainly seem to take other people's posts the way you want to read them.
Are they ?
I find it interesting that all who are decrying Israel here have NEVER said one word about the MANY Muslim nations who not only refuse to allow Israelis to travel there, but treat the Jews they DO acquiesce to remain there as second class citizens (if they haven't already forced them to leave), but if ISRAEL does something that takes away a privilege from anyone (although it did NOT interfere with equality before the law, as stated in the article) the screams can be heard from here to the other side of the world. And with THAT in mind, the avatar of this article speaks of Israeli racism and hypocrisy. Talk about hypocrisy.
However, if I post an article that says (and I did) that Abbas has announced that when Palestine becomes a legal state it will be made JUDENREIN, and that selling land to Jews is a crime (When I was a little kid we lived three doors and across the road from a community in Canada where the LAND TITLES WERE RESTRICTED - i.e. no sales to Jews.) I will be labeled an ISLAMOPHOBE by members here.
IMO, if the Arabs are so unhappy about this new legislation, they can go back to where most of their ancestors (if not themselves) came from - to Jordan, Egypt (like Arafat), Syria and wherever. Funny - that makes me think of all the people who screamed that they would leave the USA when Trump was elected (and the hordes of immigrants trying to walk into Canada over the unmarked border). LOL
Buzz, Israel is held up to a much higher standard than most muslim nations. That's a foregone conclusion. Do you disagree ?
I can't disagree. What bothers me is that the preference of most of the world is for the lower standard, because that is what is supported while the higher standard is disparaged. Take the UN for example.
Of course you must realize that holding Israel to a different standard, and not treating it equally with other nations, is known as "Double Standard" and is defined by the Ottawa Protocol, which is copied by the US Dept of State, as anti-Semitism.
Buzz,
I agree that there is a double standard going on when how we deal with the Arab Nations and Israel, and I get what you are saying. Jews have been thrown out of almost every Arab state in the region and that is wrong. But, do two wrongs make a right? Or even more so, does this piece of legislation help Israel in any way, or hurt it. I feel it hurts it morally and internationally, even if it actually does nothing..which we are not sure yet.
The Arabs can burn the Israeli crops and forests and kill the wildlife therein, even kill falcons by sending them with incendiaries into Israel, send rockets into Israeli civilian areas that burst in houses and kindergarten yards and nobody says a fucking thing, but GOD FORBID the Israeli government should stipulate in a law that Israel should uphold the Israeli Declaration of Independence that it should be a Jewish Nation and the whole world explodes. THAT'S a double standard.
The Ottawa Protocol:
No one is excusing evil deeds by... anyone.
The attacks you speak of are totally unrelated to the “nation state” law. It is in no way a reasonable or logical response. It does nothing to prevent further attacks, and it does not impact the attackers.
IF you follow the thread from Pat, Perrie and myself you will note that the conversation was about the double standard imposed when it comes to Israel, and to the attitude of Westerners concerning that double standard, and I used for reference the difference in the attitude of Westerners in the circumstances between the terrorism of the Arabs (ignored) and the desire of Israelis to confirm the fact that Israel is and will continue to be a Jewish nation, with equal rights to non-Jews, in accordance with its Declaration of Independence (now exceptionally criticized).
Double standards are always bad. Always....