Israel remains an 'island of stability' among hostile Islamist movements

lets see you write your oppinon in one of the muslim states, then you will get a lesson in repression

yes apart from Sierra Leone, Nigeria,Afghanistan, Somalia, Sudan, Pakistan, North Korea, Sri Lanka, Tunisia, Russia, Turkey, China, Iraq, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Gaza, Libya, Indonesia, Tibet, Iran, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia,Burma, most of the rest of Africa...you are 100% correct.

But Israel remains the same with its Shas and Lukud extremists. israelis should worry about this.

Stop what are you actually talking about? The difference between Israel and the USA is that Israel has legitimacy to the land it is trying to occupy, the USA never ever did.

Atleat are women are allowed to drive, allowed to marry who they want and not dress covered in sheets in the middle of the desert. lol.

Still, you're not above using Israel's free press to spread your mendacious hate, something you couldn't do in any Arab paper; or didn't that occur to you? You're well named 'ashamed' it's richly deserved!

Can a Christian woman marry a Jewish man in Israel? Can a Jew marry a Moslem? in Israel? Are you aware of the fact that Israel is a theocracy lacking a constitution and thus making the orthodox automatically to law-makers? Come on, please!

If that's the criteria. Then I'll have you know (unless you already know, but spout untruths for your own purposes of advancing your own narrative), women are allowed to do all those things in: Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Egypt, Oman, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain, (even Syria btw).. and others. We all have internet connections, and travel. Pull the other one.

Israel is a democratic state. The religious element in Israel has had an overly strong hand on Israeli social affairs from day one, as a result of what I believe to have been a mistaken but perhaps necessary (at the time Israel's survival was in jeapardy) compromise at the time of Israel's formation. What that did was give senior Rabbinical types much too much power over internal affairs such as marriage. The impact on the political scene however comes from a different direction, that being the system of proportional representation in Israel which has created a tendency for social groups such as the religious Jews, as well as the Muslims, to support individual parties which then end up with far too much influence given the political realities. A third factor affecting the outlook of the Israeli electorate is the experiences with the surrounding Arab countries and non-states over the past 65 years since Israel became a state. THose experiences have pushed the electorate from where it started- a largely socialistic, left wing, union oriented and peace oriented electorate, to what today would be regarded as a right wing, pragmatic, and more aggressive electorate which is leading to a higher level of support for right wing parties. This swing to the right is not permanent- this is, after all, a democracy and the experience of the Israelis will dictate future voting outcomes. But for now, what do you expect when a nascent country has to defend itself over and over again, has experienced more terrorism per capita than any country on earth, has given back territory multiple times without gaining real peace, and which continues to be under existential threat such that it must conscript its young people into its army in order to survive? Major swings over time in voter outcomes in democracies take place for reasons. The reasons here are obvious. And the origins of the majority of the swing are not religious based.

not the ones you mention. What bothers me is the increasing power of the extreme right and the ultra-Orthodox (haredim), the lack of freedom of religion for Jews, the income gap bertween rich and poor, second only to the United States. The "military excesses" you mention are a figmernt of your imagination. Operation Piilar of Cloud and Cast Lead were a necessary counter to thousands of Hamas rockets fired at civilian targets in Israel.

Yeah, he'd be fighting the rebels there, as well as everywhere else. He certainly wouldn't have turned it over to "Hezbollah and Iranian troops".

Israel apologists just love justifying Israeli crimes, no matter how many violations of international law they commit. More signs of decaying morality in society.

Israel beginng with occupieing the whole middle east? No more egypt, no more jurdan, no more syria Only occupied countries? But, make peace with all you neighbors also is possible.

It's the land and water theft and apartheid that are the problems.

For a keen reader you are clueless. The fact that unions can go on strike without the military attacking them does mean the country is stable. But in this case the writer is speaking about Israel as being stable compared to all the surrounding countries that are not stable.

@Arnold "concept of storyline" or by other words propaganda? When people go on strike, when there is big social unjustice, when people are clearly dissatisfied with the government, when people burn themselves alive, when citizens do not care for each other, each and every symptom is relevant. But I'm guessing, only this current piece by itself standing on it's own is relevant to you or else your warped reality won't survive.

u think the probs u mention dont exist in every "wealthy" country in the world..hey in usa they give out food stamps.

Russia doesn't have labor strikes. Does that make it an island of stability?

Take a cross section of Asian, North American, South American, European, and Eurasion and whatever other portion of the globe I omitted. Now compare those to the Middle Eastern Islamic countries and analyze which country(s) has shown a total disregard for one another. No matter how many Muslims have died at the hands of an Israeli cannot dare come within a hair's breath of the hundreds of thousands of Arab/Muslims killed by other Arab/Muslims.