Still a democracy? - Haaretz

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Sat., November 17, 2007 Kislev 7, 5768

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Last update - 09:30 15/11/2007

Still a democracy?

By Shulamit Aloni

tags: Israel, ultra-Orthodox

The government of Israel, with all due respect, does not represent the Jewish people but rather the citizens of the State of Israel who elected it. Israel is a sovereign state, which is still considered to be a democracy. In other words, it is a state for all of its citizens. Therefore it must not demand of the Palestinians to recognize it as a Jewish state, because in that way it would be declaring that any citizen whose mother is not Jewish or who did not convert with our strict Orthodox rabbis is a second-rate citizen, and his rights as a human being and a citizen are not ensured.

The Jews are a people but not a nation, they are a religious ethnic group or as respected a tribe as may be. The Jewish citizens of Britain, including the Orthodox among them, are British, and that is what is written in their passports and in the British population registry.

The same is true of France; the Jews there are French. In Canada, they are Canadians, and in Holland they are Dutch. They uphold their Jewish lives in their communities, since in democratic nations there is freedom of religion and freedom from religion. If they were to register the Jewish citizens in these countries as "Jewish" in the nationality category, we would accuse them of being anti-Semitic.

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There is a difference between a people and a religion and a nationality, since nationality is decided by citizenship - a people as opposed to a nation - and therefore citizenship is nationality. The affinity of a citizen to the state is based on citizenship and not on religion; it is not based on the tribe nor on the heritage of the genes of the mother.

If among the cabinet ministers there are those who feel that they are more Jewish than Israeli, that is their right, and they can uphold all the religious precepts and pray all the prayers. But that is not relevant to the ties between the State of Israel and its neighbors.

There are people among us who like to repeat that this is a Jewish state and not a state of all its citizens. It is strange that the demand has been raised of the Palestinians, as a condition for ending the occupation, to recognize a state where some 20 percent of its citizens have inferior status.

In the past it was a great joy to be an Israeli. Israel was father to the nations. The word "Jewish" does not exist in any of the prayers. There is: "And I will restore the captivity of my people Israel." And there is the people of Israel, the land of Israel, the Torah of Israel, the God of Israel and the daughter of Israel, who with the Jews is also a second-rate person.

The state of Israel was established as a civilian state, as a state of law, and not as a state of Halakha (Jewish religious law), by the "representatives of the Jewish yishuv and the Zionist movement." Not by the ultra-Orthodox to whom the cabinet ministers enslave themselves, and whose masses they release from military service, from working, and from tuition fees, and even pay them a monthly wage.

In the document establishing the state, it was promised that there would be "complete equality of rights for all its citizens regardless of origin, race or gender." And another reminder: On the Day of Independence, we light 12 beacons, the number of the tribes of Israel.

Let the cabinet ministers feel at home as Jews as much as they want, let them raise their voices in prayer and let them lay tefillin (phylacteries) - but they must remember that they serve the government of Israel, which still represents itself as being democratic. In other words, they are the representatives of all its citizens and are responsible for them.

Therefore it would be better to demand of the Palestinians to recognize Israel as a sovereign state, and not to coerce them with what the citizens coerce us - religion and its rabbis.

The existing arrangement was suitable for the Catholic Spain of Isabella and Ferdinand at the end of the 15th century. That is when the expulsion from Spain took place, since Spanish nationality was granted only to the Catholics or to those who converted to Catholicism.

If it is more important to be a Jew than it is to be an Israeli, why do we demand of the Jews of the world to come here at a time when they are having it good in the democratic countries in which they live as Jews?

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1.	I would rather have a "Jewish" Israel whose politicians....	09:47	\|	Swiss (Dino)	15/11/07

2.	Israel a Jewish Nation	09:49	\|	Khaled	15/11/07

3.	From The Chaos of Arguments And Demands, The Voice Of Reason !!	09:52	\|	viewerfromafar	15/11/07

4.	Move to Syria, Move to Arabia, Move to UAE	09:56	\|	Efox	15/11/07

5.	Shulamit, I agree, but why do you...	10:39	\|	Zvi	15/11/07

6.	erroneous argument	10:59	\|	Adan S	15/11/07

7.	a jewish state	11:04	\|	leo solomon	15/11/07

8.	Religion and national identity	11:39	\|	Joseph	15/11/07

9.	Shulamit Baloney	12:00	\|	j10	15/11/07

10.	The League, Churchill and Weitzman	12:15	\|	Joseph	15/11/07

11.	Israel is considered, but actualy not demodratic	12:35	\|	Shadi Fadda	15/11/07

12.	how could I disagree	14:24	\|	the Shaigetz	15/11/07

13.	#2 Khalid THANK YOU SIR!!!!!	14:31	\|	Petra	15/11/07

14.	EFOX, AGREED AND I SECOND THAT!!!	14:33	\|	Petra	15/11/07

15.	irrlevant	14:34	\|	marwan	15/11/07

16.	#10 Joseph	14:36	\|	Boycott	15/11/07

17.	ADAN bingo!	14:39	\|	Petra	15/11/07

18.	THANK YOU JOSEPH. WELL SAID!	14:41	\|	Petra	15/11/07

19.	YES, JOSEPH AND THE ARABS TRIED TO KILL THAT TOO!	14:47	\|	Petra	15/11/07

20.	MARWAN CARE TO WAGER ON THAT?	15:24	\|	Petra	15/11/07

21.	Without Friedman`s SupremeCourt Controls Israel is No Democracy	15:24	\|	Mike	15/11/07

22.	to Khaled #2	15:55	\|	zeev	15/11/07

23.	20 percent of its citizens have inferior status.	15:59	\|	Pedro	15/11/07

24.	Democracy?	17:13	\|	Warren	15/11/07

25.	Israel not a Jewish state?	17:15	\|	David Gershon	15/11/07

26.	WROOOOOONG	17:17	\|	MarkC	15/11/07

27.	A non-Jewish Israel makes as much sense as Judaism without Jews	17:28	\|	Gili	15/11/07

28.	#22 Really?!	17:35	\|	Gili	15/11/07

29.	Shulamit Aloni agrees with Meir Kahane?	18:03	\|	Myer Rosen	15/11/07

30.	status of immigration	18:33	\|	diaspora citizen	15/11/07

31.	Democratic and Jewish at the same time	19:35	\|	Cosmo	15/11/07

32.	#22, don`t be ridiculous.	19:38	\|	Yoni Gross	15/11/07

33.	Two State Solution	19:57	\|	Simcha	15/11/07

34.	Would Israel stamp "Arab" in the ID cards of those that were NOT	20:11	\|	Isabella Rossanto	15/11/07

35.	Jewish state	20:13	\|	samson	15/11/07

36.	why annapolis and oslo if we think like that	20:31	\|	zionist forever	15/11/07

37.	immigration	20:39	\|	samson	15/11/07

38.	I agree 100% Dino (#1)	20:44	\|	Polybios	15/11/07

39.	A Democratic State	20:44	\|	Jan van Mil	15/11/07

40.	MUSLIM NATIONS, CHRISTIAN NATIONS	21:03	\|	Iskander	15/11/07

41.	Naive and limited vision	21:09	\|	Scharker Yid	15/11/07

42.	Israel`s Demand Attempts to Hide Israel`s Ulterior motives	21:45	\|	Lev Bronstein	15/11/07

43.	Israel and the rule of law	21:54	\|	MIchael	15/11/07

44.	A Democratic State?	21:55	\|	Avi Yerushalmi	15/11/07

45.	Israel and the rule of law	22:11	\|	Michael	15/11/07

46.	to MarkC #26	22:18	\|	zeev	15/11/07

47.	EDUCATION!	22:42	\|	NICOL	15/11/07

48.	Good Article	23:02	\|	Faisal Ansari	15/11/07

49.	#11 - Take a deep breath and read a little further	23:21	\|	Citizen	15/11/07

50.	BRAVO! Shumalit Gets It. Why Aren`t There More Like Shumalit?	23:32	\|	Proud Pal Defender	15/11/07

51.	# 23 Joseph	01:14	\|	Axel	16/11/07

52.	# 45 Michael	01:25	\|	Axel	16/11/07

53.	The Republic of Turkey as a model for Israel?	01:48	\|	Morris Valentine	16/11/07

54.	Israel a democracy	02:10	\|	Eliahu	16/11/07

55.	Still a democracy?	02:35	\|	mosh	16/11/07

56.	re: Shadi Fadda	03:58	\|	Efox	16/11/07

57.	re: Morris Valentine: Turkish Army Trumps "Democracy"	04:02	\|	Efox	16/11/07

58.	Faisal (#48)	04:18	\|	Michael	16/11/07

59.	# 4 hey efoxy, who`s your daddy?	05:04	\|	eric	16/11/07

60.	An honest response	05:56	\|	John Thomas	16/11/07

61.	Not a democracy	06:22	\|	Denise	16/11/07

62.	When will she be arrested for sedition	06:41	\|	Mordechai	16/11/07

63.	To Axel (#52)	07:01	\|	Morris Valentine	16/11/07

64.	# 59 to denise by the bay	09:20	\|	eric	16/11/07

65.	The Nation is Israeli, the religion is Judaism - what is Jewish?	10:09	\|	Velvl Shmerlson	16/11/07

66.	The difference between a Jew and an Israelite	07:27	\|	Margaret	17/11/07

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