Israeli Democracy
Excellent article on the Guardian website today by Nimer Sultany on the issue of Israel's Arab population and its lack of civil rights. An excerpt:
"Imagine the following situation in the United States:
The US amends the constitution to define itself as a "White Evangelical and democratic state" and leaves "equal protection of the laws" outside the constitution; a federal organ called the White Evangelical National Fund promotes settlement and allocation of land for White Evangelicals only; a federal organ called White Evangelical Agency encourages and helps White Evangelicals all over the world to immigrate to the US since it is the Promised Land for Whites; a federally-funded Center for Demography working to increase the birthrates of White Evangelicals to ensure their status as a majority and discusses ways to "persuade" non-white citizens to have less children; a federal Immigration and Absorption Department dedicated exclusively for White Evangelicals; a law prohibiting mixed marriages inside the US between American citizens and non-White-Evangelical foreigners (the Supreme Court upholds the law since Earl Warren is no longer on the bench); an immigration law providing automatic citizenship and financial government benefits for White Evangelicals only; the administration declares most of the private lands as public domain owned collectively by white people, and non-whites are denied any rights in these lands; the president appoints a Chief Evangelical Priest for the US, the administration funds his office as well as dozens of White Evangelical religious schools and institutions, and the Congress starts its session after the elections by reading Biblical verses; the head of the FBI publicly states that non-white citizens are "strategic threat" and "demographic threat" to the White Evangelical character of the country; some members of the Congress publicly and routinely demand the expulsion of the non-white citizens; 65% of the white majority regularly expresses in public opinion polls its demand from the administration to encourage the emigration of non-whites outside the country; and 60 years of constant official state of emergency with Emergency Regulations invoked occasionally to prevent non-white leaders from leaving the country and to close their newspapers and NGOs.
Unfortunately this is the daily reality of the Palestinian-Arab citizens in Israel (18% of the total population). All the above-mentioned elements, and more, exist in the Israeli law and political culture: Jewish National Fund, Jewish Agency, etc. Yet, many pro-Israelis defy the facts and still argue that Israel is a democracy where Jews and Arabs have equal rights. "
Labels: Israel/Palestine
4 Comments:
Any state has the right to control who immigrates in, so that makes the Jewish Agency perfectly fine. The Jewish National Fund actually predates the State of Israel, so I don't see where you can object to that. And states actually have the right to "encourage" whatever they want.
Where has the State of Israel done something clearly coercive against the Israeli Arabs?
Hi - thanks for your comment.
The basic misconception here is that the Israeli state has rights. States don't have rights. People have rights.
The immigration issue is pretty straightforward, and Anthony Loewenstein put it very well here
http://tonykaron.com/2007/06/11/loewenstein-equality-not-zionism-will-save-israel/
"How should we explain to Palestinians that they can’t return to the lands of their ancestors, but I, as an Australian Jew, can arrive in Israel and automatically gain citizenship?"
It should only need to be added that for many Palestinians, Israel is not just the land of their ancestors but the land that they themselves were ethnically cleansed from just 60 years ago.
On the national fund, I can't say I see the relevance of its predating the existence of the state. What's relevant is its behaviour, i.e. the seizure of stolen land whose owners had been ethnically cleansed and its subsequent reservation of this stolen land for sale - in the main - to Jews only. You say "I don't see where you can object to that". I think its fairly clear.
You ask "Where has the State of Israel done something clearly coercive against the Israeli Arabs?" Not sure I follow the point of the question. The article I linked to was talking about discrimination. Not coercion.
The ideal solution in the middle east is for Arabs and Jews to be allowed to settle wherever they like, with normal voting rights, and worship however they like.
So for example all the Arab lands would allow synagogues and churches to be set up for their non Muslim communities and Israel would allow mosques, churches and so on.
All the states would allow democratic elections so that all residents would have some kind of voice.
So there might be a few Jews in the Syrian government, several Arabs in the Israel one and so on. In fact, the Arabs would obviously have a majority everywhere by then, so could organise their lives accordingly in Israel.
In Jerusalem, equal rght would be accorded to all religions to access their relevant holy places.
Jews, a minority in each instance of course, would live alongside the Arabs, who would be the majority in each state because of their overall numbers. So then all could live in peace because there would be nothing to argue about. Would that work out do you think?
Valley Flyer - thanks for your comment.
I certainly agree that all the states in the Middle East - indeed all states anywhere - should be full democracies. To achieve this in the Middle East, Israel would have to make some serious reforms. Most of the other states would have to transform entirely.
On the the Israel/Palestine issue, I support the broad international consensus. I.e.:
1/ two equal states on the 1967 borders (perhaps with v.minor and mutual adjustments);
2/ a deal on the right of return where refugees have the option of moving to the new Palestinian state or taking compensation (plus full citizenship rights for those remaining in places like Lebanon); and
3/ special arrangements for Jerusalam, like those you describe, would also be in order.
In this scenario Jews would remain a majority in Israel. But as a proper democracy, it could no longer discriminate against its Arab minority.
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