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The reaction to the new Israeli law, similar to a constitutional amendment, could not have been more divided.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who heads a coalition government considered the most right in the history of Israel, called the newly minted law a "landmark", and posed for a selfie of celebration in the parliamentary chamber. Elsewhere in the building, Israeli-Arab legislators shredded copies of the legislation.
The split screen reaction to the Knesset last Thursday followed immediately after the parliament passed a law that enshrined the state of Israel as an exclusively Jewish national project. .
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Long hailed by supporters and ridiculed by detractors as harmful or useless at best, the legislation boils down decades of tension between Israel as a democracy and as a state. Jewish.
"Basic Law: Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People", the legislation elevates the status of Hebrew in relation to Arabic, encourages "Jewish colonization" and omits any reference to democracy or equality for the Arab minority of Israel, which represents 20% of the population.
"It's a stab in the back," says Kamal Adwan, editor-in-chief of "Hona," a newspaper of the Druze community that, unlike most Israeli Arab groups, sends its graduates in the Israeli army
"This law does not give equality to the citizens of the country, and classifies them according to different levels of citizenship," he says. "The Druze community is still considered part of the state, and suddenly they discover that he is a second-class citizen."
Mohammed Dawarshe, an Arab activist who works for Coexistence with Israeli Jews, says that he learned about democracy and equal rights in political science courses at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. adding that the nation-state bill upsets these notions.
"It's a downgrade, I considered myself a citizen, and Israel is my state," he said. "Today, the state says to me," I am not your state. I feel stateless, a political orphan who buried his political father. It's a sad development for me and my community. "
At first glance, the law apparently states the obvious: it consecrates the country's national anthem, establishes the banner of the Star of David with the blue and white flag and reaffirms the law of the return granting the Jews out of Israel automatic citizenship when they immigrate.
But there are some new wrinkles that say formalize a hierarchy between Jews and Arabs. The law declares that the "right to exercise national self-determination in the state of Israel is unique to the Jewish people. "Hebrew is recognized as the language of the state while the" state of the art ". Arabic, which was an official language alongside Hebrew since previous years The establishment of Israel is designated as a language with a special status.Another clause embraces the "Jewish colony" as a "national value" – this was watered down from an earlier version that endorsed the segregated cities
The omissions of the law are also important, critics say. The bill makes no mention of the rights of the country's Arab minority, nor discusses the principle of equality, nor does it refer to Israel's democratic system of democratic governance. The influence of legislation is all the more powerful as it is one of the 15 "fundamental laws" that establish constitutional government institutions and legal values.
Although the law has little immediate practical impact, Israeli critics say it will already poison – tense relations between Arabs and Jews, and potentially inspire anti-democratic laws and exclusive court rulings in the future.
"What do we need?"
"Israel is the nation-state of the Jewish people without this law, and this is accepted by the countries of the world, Yedidia Stern, Professor of Law at Bar-Ilan University, has does it need that? "The next generation of Supreme Court justices will be able to say that equality is not guaranteed [constitutionally] at the highest level, while Jewish character is guaranteed at the highest level.
Tzipi Livni, a former Israeli Foreign Minister whose political career began in Netanyahu's Likud party, tweeted that the passage of the law effectively made the notion of "democracy" blasphemy.
The same concern underlined the sharp statements of some American Jewish groups who criticized the bill.The American Jewish Committee (AJC) said that it was "deeply disappointed" by the adoption of the law by parliament and that it was "useless." The law "endangers "Israeli efforts to build a democracy, said AJJ. "There is a prevailing feeling that the bill has changed democratic values, and it fears that it is damaging to Judeo-Arab relations, in which American Jews are deeply invested," wrote Scott Lasensky, former diplomat American under the Obama administration. . "On top of that, and more tactically, there is a general feeling that the bill will make the defense of Israel more difficult."
American Jewish groups also believe that the law could be interpreted as formalizing discrimination Since the time of the founding of the nation, Israelis have struggled to find a balance between two seemingly contradictory values: the reason for 39 to be of the country as a homeland for the Jews and an aspiration to a democracy that ensures equal rights for all its citizens. These values are enumerated in the 1948 Israeli Declaration of Independence, but they have never been codified in a formal constitution.
Avraham Diskin, professor of political science at the Hebrew University and long-time advocate of the bill, says legislation is needed. establish a right to self-determination for Jews. While the values of democracy, equality and human rights are enshrined in other fundamental Israeli laws, such as the "fundamental law: human dignity and freedom", the Jewish character of the country was ignored.
The world denied the right to self-determination is the Jewish people, even though the Jewish people are willing to recognize the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, "says Professor Diskin. The fundamental law of the nation-state was also necessary to serve as a judicial counterbalance to the fundamental laws that emphasize democracy and human rights.
During the debate before the Adoption of the bill, one of its main sponsors, Avi Dichter The Likud and chairman of the Knesset Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defense has proposed a more provocative defense, claiming that the purpose of the legislation is to stifle the demands of Arab citizens to establish a "state of all its citizens" from the Israeli right because it would claim to deny Israel a Jewish character.
"You have not been here before us, and you do not will not stay here after us. All you can do is live as a national minority among us, "said Dichter in plenary, addressing Arab colleagues." We are passing this bill to avoid even a little thought or discussion. Effort, to turn Israel into a state of all its citizens. "
GLOBAL TREND
Observers said the law, which had gone through many iterations and versions over nearly a decade , reflects Netanyahu's demand that Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state in peace negotiations Israeli right-wing supporters complain that if the international community supports a Palestinian state, then it should recognize Israel as a state of the Jewish people
According to some critics, the new fundamental law is part of an international trend of nativist ascendant nationalists, forces in Europe and the United States seeking Moreover, with the strong support of the Trump administration, the Israeli government felt that it had more leeway to adopt such nationalistic reforms. "We are in a fight like many other countries to preserve our democratic culture," says Yossi Klein Halevi. , author of the book "Letter to my Palestinian neighbor" and senior researcher at the non-partisan Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem. Although Israel's democracy has not been dismantled, says Halevi, the basic law is provocative and lacks sensitivity for Arab citizens.
"Israel is based on two non-negotiable identities," he says. "The homeland of all Jews, whether or not they are citizens of Israel, and it is the state of all its citizens, whether they are Jewish or not." 19659033 "Anything that disturbs this balance, in both directions, is a threat to Israel."
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