Same reason Russia is getting flak for invading and occupying territory (including, even, from Israel!) when Israel has illegally occupied the West Bank for decades with no consequences.
Western countries apply their moral principles differently to their allies.
South Africa abstained to vote on UN resolution against Russian large attack on Ukraine.
West didn't ignore apartheid, they quietly supported it, because USSR supported Mandela and anti-apartheid struggle. Kinda "enemy of my enemy is my friend".
IMHO that was the stupidest position of the US, they should've "united" with USSR on anti-apartheid position.
When one factor "Capitalism vs. Communism" is the lens through which you view the world, then "are they on our side" becomes more important than "are they good people".
That is why the west supported some terrible regimes, including Apartheid South Africa and Pinochet in Chile. Because they could claim to be "anti-communist".
The old regime in south Africa prior to 1994 was a "western ally". Reagan and Thatcher turned a blind eye to Apartheid (and sometime supported it) because the South African government was "anti-communist", or at least they dressed their oppression in that language of "total onslaught of Soviet communism" and that was more important to the west.
The new regime in south Africa has some nostalgia for the assistance offered to them by the USSR back then, that is why they abstained on the vote on UN resolution against Russian attack on Ukraine.
> West Bank was occupied after a war that Israel did not start
That is irrelevant ancient history. What matters is that they continue expanding their occupation (building new settlements, passing new discriminatory laws, etc.) today.
I'm not a fan of the occupation of the West Bank, but those are not 1:1 scenarios. West Bank was occupied after Jordan initiated the offensive, not Israel, as opposed to Russia who is the aggressor.
A 1:1 scenario would be if Ukraine invaded Russia and then Russia took control over Ukraine territory, which in that case i'd argue the outcry would be minimal.
The fact that the Arab world united and attempted to destroy Israel through invasion multiple times is not ancient history and certainly not irrelevant.
I think continuing to occupy West Bank and Gaza is unconscionable.
But you’re mischaracterising the strategic importance of the West Bank. If it was a sovereign nation, the logical thing for the West Bank government to do would be to place artillery on the high ground near Israeli cities. The artillery would be sufficiently protected and would be capable of causing widespread destruction. That’s powerful negotiating leverage, even if the artillery isn’t used. This is similar to the state Seoul is in - within range of NK artillery.
That’s why there is no 2 state solution the Israelis will agree to where the Palestinian state operates its own military. It might be morally right, but it would be a death sentence for Israel.
Not arguing your statements, they make sense, but with this logic, horrible amoral inhumane things can be done (and are done daily) to innocent civilians basically forever, anywhere... not something I can accept.
Not that my opinion makes any meaningful impact on global scale, but I do at least vote with wallet and don't buy any Israeli products. I respect their military prowess but I have much higher moral expectations from place I will anyhow support with my money.
It would theoretically be a risk for Israeli citizens living close to the border, but would lead to an overwhelming punitive response from the Israeli army, strongly backed by America.
Israel has by far the most capable military in the region, routinely inflicts casualty ratios of 10-20:1 in its favour in any conflict with Palestinians, and is backed by the most powerful military in the world.
The threat posed by an independent Palestine would be negligible. However the spectre of that threat is used to justify the continued occupation and expropriation of the West Bank.
Yes, just like the obviously better equipped South Korean armed forces will eventually defeat North Korea. They’re backed by the most powerful military in the world, as you say.
But artillery still exists. And if the enemy has the high ground and the cities are in the plains, the death toll will be in the tens of thousands before victory is achieved.
This is the reason every citizen in Seoul knows where the nearest bomb shelter is. I can understand (but not condone) someone wanting to avoid that fate.
A two-state solution isn't wanted by Israel (at least, not by the settlers and their supporters), nor by most Palestinians. Israel wants to keep the whole of the West Bank. Most Palestinians would like to live in a single state that isn't based on apartheid and oppression.
It's really hard to imagine a two-state solution working, when leading Israeli politicians repeatedly declare that Israel consists of all the land between the Jordan and the sea. And even if it could be agreed, Israel would remain a segregated state. A single state with one-man one-vote would quickly put an end to apartheid, and to many of the most serious complaints of the Palestinians.
The argument against a single-state solution is that it would put an end to the idea of a "Jewish homeland". That is true; but a "Jewish homeland" must necessarily be an apartheid homeland, which discriminates against non-Jews.
Because it’s under military occupation. And not recognized as Israeli territory by anyone, including Israel.
If the territory had been annexed and put under civilian law and everyone there had been given Israeli citizenship 60 years ago, I would indeed agree that although that was bad, it’s not worth crying over spilled milk in the present day, much like e.g. the British conquest of Quebec. But that’s not the case. It remains a military occupation and bad stuff continues to happen, today.
Quebec happened because britian and france signed a peace treaty that both sides respected. Nobody has managed to cobble together a peace treaty for the israel-palestine situation that actually got respected.
I disagree, the peace of paris (with its conditions like respecting roman catholics) not the battle, is what lead to quebec being relatively peacefully integrated into british rule. (To be clear not saying that things were perfect or anything)
The people of the West Bank have engaged in terrorism against Israeli civilians up to 2005 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Intifada - and that's not particularly ancient history.
If the Ukraine war goes on for 50 more years you might start to see Ukrainians attacking Russian civilians too, once it’s clear they have no other option.
People in the UK have engaged in terrorism against UK citizens up until the present; that doesn't justify the UK occupying Ireland, and installing groups of settlers.
I know, that's exactly what England did under Cromwell; one of my ancestors was such a settler.
I don't have a lot of background in this, so tell me if I'm off-base. Israel is occupying land that it took from Palestine, is it not? I don't feel that terrorism is the correct term for attacks on an occupying force.
Yeah, typically if you agree with them they are "freedom fighters" if you don't they're "terrorists".
In my opinion, most long running conflicts tend to have both sides doing terrible things over the course of the conflict, so its rare there is one side that is "good" and one that is "evil".
It's also not a complete 1:1 because the a big reason they are holding these territories is for national security. The west bank and golan heights are both ideal places which can be used to launch rockets into israeli. They tried relinquishing the gaza strip and what immediately happened was hamas took over it and started firing rockets at israel. so they're not likely to change their mind about the other territories after that.
If Israel was an ally they would be helping to supply weapons and armor to Ukraine. Instead they will not supply anything more than medication. The US gives Israel plenty of military $ for them to share in times of need.
As a strictly emotional thought, this makes me feel Israel is a country to cozy up to the strongest nation at the time. If the US falls from grace Israel will have no problem ‘switching’ sides to Russia.
"Israel Passes U.S. Military Technology to China" [1]
"a 2013 National Intelligence Estimate on cyber threats “ranked Israel the third most aggressive intelligence service against the US” behind only China and Russia" [2]
"Israel among the U.S.’s most threatening cyber-adversaries and as a “hostile” foreign intelligence service." [3]
"Israel’s snooping upset White House because information was used to lobby Congress to try to sink a deal" [4]
How a so called ally can perform such levels of espionage and the US has a hand in paying for their own ‘downfall’. I suppose the only reason Israel gets away with it is due to the influence Israel has on politicians with AIPAC/lobbying efforts.
> As a strictly emotional thought, this makes me feel Israel is a country to cozy up to the strongest nation at the time. If the US falls from grace Israel will have no problem ‘switching’ sides to Russia.
That's in line with Israel's priorities, which first and foremost is its own survival.
At lot people kind of lazily expect Israel to act like your typical invincible Western state, but it's pretty vulnerable. It's also probably acutely aware of that fact, since within living memory all its neighbors vowed to destroy it and nearly did so.
I understand you are mentioning many countries. But to touch just on Mexico. Personally, I do not believe Mexico to be an ally. Mexico seems to be a narco state that is largely run by cartel sponsored politicians.
> If Israel was an ally they would be helping to supply weapons and armor to Ukraine.
Citation needed. A strongly held opinion isn't a fact.
> Instead they will not supply anything more than medication. The US gives Israel plenty of military $ for them to share in times of need.
They have or are going to have a field hospital, and have given aid to Ukraine and surrounding countries.
Israel is a US ally. Israel would be strategically harmed by pissing off Russia (they depend on Russian good will to stop Iranian spread of weapons to Syria and Lebanon). And for what - symbolic gain alone?
It's pretty obvious what the Israeli government and population generally seem to think about Russia's actions (as it is obvious what the Chinese government and Chinese population generally seem to think, another country that's trying to stay more "on the fence" but clearly supportive as opposed to Israel that is clearly not supportive).
Israel can also help mediate the end of this conflict as they have pretty good relations with both Ukraine and Russia, and odds of that are higher if they don't give or sell weapons directly to Ukraine.
> As a strictly emotional thought, this makes me feel Israel is a country to cozy up to the strongest nation at the time. If the US falls from grace Israel will have no problem ‘switching’ sides to Russia.
What you are describing in geopolitics. Israel is not special in this regard.
One major factor of alliances is realpolitik and benefits to ones' country. The US has close relations to Israel for many reasons, and the relationship didn't benefit the US in some or many ways, do you really think the US would be a close ally of Israel?
For any smaller country (in terms of population, economics, etc) like Israel, being aware of the massive countries (like the US, China, EU, to a lesser extent Japan and India) are sensible considerations. The US would do the same thing in Israel or any similar sized country's position, would it not?
You advocate giving (or selling) weapons. That isn't symbolic alone, so I'd remove this if I could. It's really more common to see the view that Israel isn't taking a clear enough stance again Russia with symbolic things. It seems pretty clear (see the UN vote).
Nonetheless, Israel giving or selling weapons would complicate an already tricky relationship with Russia. Russia may act as if it is an act of war (arguably it would be reasonable for Russia to do so).
2. India is another country to consider. While not as close an ally to the US compared to Israel, they are either an ally or friendly (depending on the arena / what you mean by ally). India abstained from voting in the UN vote criticizing Russia's invasion of Ukraine. In US media and social media, they got relatively little criticism and attention for this compared to comments I've seen directed at Israel. Even though Israel did in fact vote to criticize Russia. Some people in this thread were at best unaware or at worst lied about this basic, verifiable fact. Apparently Israel even lobbied some other countries to vote the same way they did.
India's reasons for abstaining are also realpolitik and largely driven from considerations around military cooperation with Russia. I don't know too much about Indian / Russian military cooperation, but from what I've read it is much closer and deeper than Israel and Russia. Israel and Russia I'd describe as having few overlaps and at a distance. I'd characterize it as Russia begrudgingly accepting Israel's occasional attacks on Syrian targets and / or Iranian targets in Syria that are trying to supply better weapons to Hezbollah, Hamas, or other people closer to Israel. Given that Syria is a close ally of Russia, it's mildly awkward for Russia, but Syria depends on Russia more than the other way around, Russia is more powerful, Israel is useful for Russia for economic reasons, and Russia can understand Israel's military considerations.
The government most certainly not. But the assertion by Russia is that the nazi nationalists attacked the separatists. Of course, you or I could say that’s complete bs. But then I would say the same about Israel’s claims about the beginnings of the intifadas.
It’s no doubt a powerful thought experiment to imagine a Palestinian version of Nelson Mandela sitting in a Israeli prison right now serving a life sentence, entirely sure that is where they have been fated to die, and after a 27 year term this person will not only unexpectedly be released and gain their freedom, they will go on to become President of Israel and win a Nobel Peace Prize.
The fact that Israel was created specifically as a national refuge for a historically marginalized and genocided people makes it very difficult to make nuanced criticism of that country. The rhetorical distance between anti-Zionism[0] and anti-Semitism is actually not that high. You can make a nuanced critique of Israel, but most people doing so would much rather consider the people and the government one and the same... and call for death to both of them. Conversely, early on in Israel's history, a lot of well-meaning people really did think we actually needed a Jewish-majority nation to prevent another Holocaust; so they had even more support than they do today.
Geopolitically, Israel made the diplomatic masterstroke of allying itself heavily with America, which makes it rather difficult to actually punish them through the official channels for such things. Even things like symbolic non-binding UN condemnations of the most heinous things Israel has done would get regularly vetoed by the US up until recently.
Furthermore, there's a question that most anti-Zionism doesn't have a good answer to: how do we keep another Holocaust from happening? Winding down the underlying Israel-Palestine conflict in a one-state solution means significantly diluting the Jewish majority in Israel with people who are, justifiably, very angry about the shit Israel did. Actually, they're unjustifiably angry, too; and one of the prevailing political parties in Palestine has made "commit another Holocaust" one of their explicit goals[1].
Conditioning any peace solution on special protected status for Jews might fix this, but the only difference between that and "special protected status for whites in South Africa" is an increasingly flimsy social context that's doing an awful lot of work. It would be difficult to balance the need to prevent another Holocaust against the needs of Palestinians, and the sort of right-wingers that like the idea of race wars would absolutely insist on their needs overriding the "other side's"[2].
Nothing I said above should be taken as justifying Israel's nonsense, or the nonsense of Hamas, of course. But Zionism relies upon all other alternatives either being unworkable, or worse. Israel is very much akin to an apartheid state, but all the countries that can really put pressure on Israel to stop that have no moral authority to do so. The UK and France are responsible for partitioning Palestine in the first place; Germany killed six million Jews; and America refused to admit refugees from that genocide. Zionism is banking on history repeating[3]; or at least people believing that it will repeat should Israel step back from the brink of ethnostate nationalism.
[0] For the purpose of this comment I will restrict "Zionism" to just the demand for a non-secular Jewish state in the land currently occupied by Israel and/or Palestine; i.e. Zionism in it's current form.
Granted, this is #NotAllOfHamas, but party hardliners still insist it's their manifesto.
[2] Insamuch as you can even neatly divide the people in question into two "sides". In fact, Israel and Palestine do not divide neatly into Jewish and Muslim; there are plenty of Israeli Arabs and Palestinian Jews out there.
[3] When they aren't insisting that this is an "ancient conflict" to make their side seem more legitimate.
> Did Britain allow tens of thousands of Nazi party members to emigrate to the UK during the Blitz?
England and the US definitely allowed Germans to move to the country before, during, and after the conflict - and plenty of them. You'd be grilled by authorities for sure, and probably observed for months afterwards, but that's it. And here you're equating members of a political party with people born in a certain country, which is not really fair.
> Should the Ukraine allow a million Russians to marry on Zoom and come live in Kiev?
Why not? They would see first-hand the result of misguided policies and likely support Ukrainian instances. Unless, of course, you think there is such thing as a "Ukrainian race" worth preserving...
This article doesn’t really provide much in the way of explanation for why this law is being enacted. Here [0] is a better article that quotes supporters and objectors to the law.
It includes the (IMHO not very convincing) figures that "Between 1993 and 2003, around 130,000 Palestinians were given Israeli citizenship or residency through family unification, including children, according to court filings. The Shin Bet security service told the Knesset on Monday that between 2001 and 2021, about 48 were involved in terror activities.”
48 of 130,000 amounts to 0.037% being involved in terrorist activities which seems very low to be used as justification for a law around security.
Blackstone's ratio says "It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer."
Assuming the ratios of terrorists to innocent spouses stays constant, 2708 innocent spouses will be denied citizenship for every terrorist mildly inconvenienced.
I'm an Israeli, politically left leaning and it's a shame that I need to write the following(and for many years I've believed the opposite) :
The Israeli Arabs are a big problem. We've seen it during the last war with Gaza, when those many Israeli Arab citizens created mobs that did many violent actions in quite a few places. Israeli people in some cities had to flee their homes. And yes there we're also Israeli mobs.
This is not the first time this happens.
It's gotten seriously bad, so bad that now the Israeli Army is building special roads bypassing areas with a lot of Israeli Arab citizens, because those areas aren't safe to use in the case of a war on our borders,
So objectively, Arabs and Jews mix very poorly.
So is it wise to add another 130K such citizens every ten years ? Or more specifically, Palestinians, who hate us even more ? Or is it just increasing the problem ?
And sure, this isn't a nice decision. We Israelis live in a partial war situation. That's the reality.
So you can't compare it to barring Mexicans from enter to the US. It's much more complicated.
That is correct. I grew up under apartheid. This phrase is key: “ Proponents say the law helps ensure Israel's security and maintains its "Jewish character".”
Consider if the US passed a law banning Mexican spouses from uniting with their US spouse to keep America’s “Christian character”.
In this context Christian almost always means white even if they try to pretend that isn't the case. At least Australia didn't mince words and called it the White Australia Policy, everyone else feels like they need to make it about religon or something else to make the racism more palatable.
I love Western Culture as a term. In Central Europe it meant whatever was on the right side of Iron Curtain (mostly liberal democracy and all what comes with it), then Iron Curtain dissapeared and it got second meaning as white, Anglo-Saxon, protestant values protected in white, orthodox/catholic Slavic countries. Currently you have to guess which one it is from the context of the sentence.
> In this context Christian almost always means white even if they try to pretend that isn't the case.
No, it doesn't. Also, aren't most Mexicans technically white (i.e. that's what they're supposed to check on a US census form)? It's just a bad analogy.
There are paths to modify that analogy to make it work (or at least work better) for the pair America and Mexico, but you're not following any of those.
Mexico is certainly more homogeneous in its Christianity, being almost entirely Catholic. I doubt its more Christian in general than the U.S. though, with its diverse array of Protestant sects.
Your second paragraph is one of the worst analogies I've seen in a while. You have to find a bordering country with a different religion with whom USA has been at war for decades.
Specifically, one of the legislative cornerstones of Apartheid in South Africa was the "Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act, 1949" (1) which prohibited marriage between person of different "racial groups".
This article fails to explain the reasons for which proponents believe that marriage with Palestinians would threaten security or Jewish character of the country, failing the supposed neutrality of the article or compromising the supposed quality of journalists in charge of investigating this.
There have been cases of Israeli citizens marrying terrorists to get them into the country. Though this law is an overreaction. It's one thing to do background checks and impose a waiting period on Palestinian spouses, but a total ban is ridiculous.
Thanks, at least we have an idea what this law is an overreaction of, I think telling a bit about that would have made the reuters article on-par with the journalistic quality that I expect from my standards.
"Israel’s parliament on Thursday passed a law denying naturalization to Palestinians from the occupied West Bank or Gaza married to Israeli citizens"
Don't agree with the headline or the law.
They aren't banning spouses, they are banning naturalization of them.
I don't know what other visas are applicable for Israel, in Japan if you get married you can get a spouse visa(1,3,5 year) but you won't be able to get a permanent residency right away.
Exactly why I'm asking why proponents believe they do: it's not in the article. Sorry if this wasn't clear, I'm non native. I'm also asking why it's not in the article. I don't mind the downvotes, but I'd love an answer ;)
That is a probability, but seems too simple, and is in complete contradiction with all the other stuff Israel has done so far make the life of arabic Israelians enjoyable there, such as hiring arab police officers, the entry of an Arab political party—the Islamist United Arab List, or Ra’am—into government for the first time has signaled that progress could be in the offing, having the same rights as Jewish Israelis...
From what I have seen with my Israeli friends (so caveat, sample size of 2 and one of them was quite a long time ago) there seem to be a serious case of collective cognitive dissonance. It’s not that they really want to hurt the Arabs (though some of them definitely do), it’s just that they don’t see this sort of things as bad. An example is the borders walls and checkpoints. Or bombing Gaza.
Paying them isn't quite the same as making them miserable, at the same time, it's the kind of proposals that a right-wing party, which I don't believe is specific to Israel, and as such, does not explain that law ... Nonetheless, thanks for the info!
If you start dating and marrying “the enemy” suddenly they’re not the enemy anymore. You start to understand them and treat them as an equal. As more mixing happens, opinion will start to shift and the state will start to see some resistance to the disturbing and inhuman way they treat Palestinians. The state doesn’t want to have to start treating Palestinian’s like equals. This law may not make marriage between the two groups illegal but it makes it unworkable.
Interesting conspiracy theory, but the actual rationale has been shared in another comment: it's an overreaction to a number of events involving marrying terrorists to get them in the country.
About "the enemy", one side is constantly attacking the other, but you might be surprised to know which is which - or, you believe you have justifications. Anyway, my conspiracy theory is that this article purposely omits contextualisation so to drive the opinion to believe that's it's a free act of pure hate, which makes it fall into the "propaganda" category rather than the "journalism" category. And I'm not even supporting this stupid bill, but I've had more than enough of this kind of jorunlasmism which purpose is apparently to tell us how to think... IMHO this jurnolims is not a solution: it's a problem. Again, not discussing the silly law, discussing about the article in itself.
> Proponents say the law helps ensure Israel's security and maintains its "Jewish character".
> "The State of Israel is Jewish and so it will remain," said Simcha Rothman of the far-right Religious Zionism party, a member of the opposition who brought the law forward with Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked.
That does not explain why they believe marriages threaten its "jewish character", it does not explain why they think that. If it's about demographics, then the article should show graphics or at least some number projections so that we can build an opinion.
Rationale 1: Terrorists are constantly looking for ways to get in a country, if the marriage background checks are proven not to be secure then it makes sense to pause it until a solution is found indeed.
Rationale 2: Jewish hate Arabs is the explanation for everything.
And I'm saying it would have been great if the article provided enough information so that we could make our own opinion based on more facts.
“There’s no need to shirk from the essence of this law. It is one of the tools to ensure a Jewish majority in Israel, which is the nation-state of the Jewish people. Our goal is for there to be a Jewish majority,” Lapid tweeted shortly before the law lapsed in early July. [1]
Thanks! considering this I'm now wondering: I fill Nigeria with Norvegians, is it still Nigeria or an extension of Norway? I believe Nigerians have the right to have their country that doesn't look like an extension of another.
The verb “Fill” is so dehumanizing. This law is about banning Arab Israelis from bringing their spouse to live with them in Israel and to have a family life together.
In fact Nigeria recognizes the right of Nigerians to bring their spouse to live with them in Nigeria and even offers Nigerian citizenship. Nigeria is actually more advanced than many western countries in this respect.
I think it's actually perfection: it enshrines the conceptual absurdity of it. It's also incredibly sad, of course, from the perspective of judging the political maturity of the human race in the third millennium CE.
“another real problem remains unresolved in Israel: The visceral hatred and contempt that many “Ashkenazi” or European-origin Israelis have for “Mizrahi” Jews, and the way that the media exacerbates racial stereotypes by repeating them without self-critique.”
That language is an explicit part of Israel - the Declaration of Independence enshrines the idea that Israel is, first and foremost, a Jewish state. In more recent times, the nature of the state is often referred to as "Jewish and democratic". It is also enshrined in the basic laws of Israel (Israel doesn't have a constitution).
This entire concept has a dedicated article on Wikipedia [0]. It's a pretty fun read for those that believe Arab(or those of other non-Jewish ehtnicities, though they are far fewer) citizens of Israel are fundamentally equal to Jewish citizens of Israel.
Basically, Israel is all for equality, but with some limits - essentially, it would not be acceptable for people who are not Jewish to have an outsize power in Israel, though they are free to participate as minority parties. This is, in my opinion, the main reason why Israel has never attempted to annex the Palestinian territories. The Arab majority (or near majority today) that would form in the population would seriously challenge the idea of a Jewish and democratic state - they would be forced to stop recognizing Arabs' right to vote and/or hold office.
Judaism is not just a religion; because of how they define membership of such religion, it's intrinsecally inseparable from a tribalistic element. Whether that ends up in outright racism, depends on who you ask.
Hindu religion is quite similar. In fact Judaism explicitly allows for conversion (which, to be sure, is a difficult process) whereas Hinduism only acknowledges "purification" of "ethnically/ancestrally Hindu" people who were introduced to other religions.
Based on ethnic identity, which is how the vast majority of non-Americas nations are structured. Japan for Japanese, Italy for Italians, Israel for Jews. As an immigrant, I’m partial to the American civic approach, but Israel ain’t special.
>Japan for Japanese, Italy for Italians, Israel for Jews
With your logic it would be like: Japan is for Shintos, Italy for Roman Catholics, Israel for Jews....sounds terrible no?
Since like forever Jews where all over the world (and called it their home) with vastly different cultures/food/music, there is not the ONE Jewish Culture but thousands, you just cant compare it to Japan or Italy.
Italy is explicitly defined in its constitution as a state that does not discriminate on the basis of religion or race. It even recognises a level of jus-soli citizenship for children of non-citizens if born in the country, although after they reach 18 years of age. So I don't know why you'd point it out as an ethnostate - which it definitely has not been for generations, if ever.
I know "Italians are racists lol" trends in football subreddits, but that has nothing to do with the law of the land.
There are two major problems when comparing these:
1. Israel wasn't formed organically, they first had to get rid of the hundreds of thousands of pesky Palestinians living in Palestine for a few hundred years. The Japanese didn't take over a, say, Chinese island and settle there (though they tried in Manchuria during WWII).
2. None of the other states you mention has anything resembling the ethno-state character of Israel. There is nothing in the Italian constitution that is even slightly aimed at making sure a non-Italian can't become president (even if not explicitly prohibiting it)[0]. Italy doesn't recognize the right of ethnic Italians to automatically become citizens by moving to Italy.
[0] though it's rare, there are well known cases of nation states having presidents of minority ethnicity. For example, right now in the middle of war, the president of Ukraine is himself Jewish. Also right now, Klaus Iohannis, of German ethnicity, is president of Romania. Peru has had an ethnically Japanese president (Alberto Fujimori) and more recently the son of an Austrian immigrant.
> The Naturalization Act of 1790 (1 Stat. 103, enacted March 26, 1790) was a law of the United States Congress that set the first uniform rules for the granting of United States citizenship by naturalization. The law limited naturalization to "free White person(s) ... of good character", thus excluding Native Americans, indentured servants, slaves, free black people and later Asians, although free black people were allowed citizenship at the state level in a number of states.
> This is, in my opinion, the main reason why Israel has never attempted to annex the Palestinian territories. The Arab majority (or near majority today) that would form in the population would seriously challenge the idea of a Jewish and democratic state - they would be forced to stop recognizing Arabs' right to vote and/or hold office.
For what it's worth Israel could go the federation route - basically, have three largely autonomous federal states, one for Jewish Israel, one for the West Bank and one for Gaza, with the federal government only taking care of finances, energy, water and security, and the rest - including passports and diplomatic relations - be done by the individual states.
Or they could do the obvious, which is to let the Palestinians form a full state within the internationally recognized borders. But Israel does not want to respect those borders so does not want to accept a two (or three) state solution with a Palestinian state.
What the fuck indeed. I can't help but think of the Nuremberg laws in Germany. More specifically the "Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor" [1]. Sure, it's not _that bad_ (e.g., the Israeli law is not banning marriages per se) but has a similar sentiment.
>> Proponents say the law helps ensure Israel's security and maintains its "Jewish character".
> What the fuck?
Israel was founded as a state for the Jewish people, so they could have some political self-determination, which given their history, doesn't seem like a such bad thing. It would entirely subvert that if it became a state controlled by other kinds of people, like all other states in the world.
Let's say Muslim Arabs become the majority in Israel, wouldn't it then become the kind of place that the ancestors of the Jewish Israelis fled from (for good reason)? There are also literally dozens of other Muslim Arab states, so the transmogrification of Israel into another would be a net-negative for diversity.
IMHO the comparisons of Israel to apartheid break down because the motivations are different. IIRC, the South African whites wanted to maintain dominance over a big subject population, the Jewish Israelis just want a state for themselves.
> Let's say Muslim Arabs become the majority in Israel, wouldn't it then become the kind of place that the ancestors of the Jewish Israelis fled from (for good reason)?
The Jews didn't exactly jump from Judea as opposed to getting pushed:
Certainly there were always Jews (and Christians, and later Muslims) in that geographic area, but to say that Jews particularly 'deserve' exclusive governing of that area may be stretching it given the two thousand years of history since they last had 'exclusivity' to it.
> IMHO the comparisons of Israel to apartheid break down because the motivations are different. IIRC, the South African whites wanted to maintain dominance over a big subject population, the Jewish Israelis just want a state for themselves.
A reasonable desire. The Poles also wanted a state for themselves for a while, and finally got one (after a messy twentieth century), but would it be okay for them to say "no blacks or Arabs" in their naturalization/citizenship laws? (Versus the perhaps 'simpler' idea of "must be fluent in Polish and be familiar with Polish culture/history".)
Palestinians also want a state of their own, but Israel is (according to some) squatting on their land:
>> Let's say Muslim Arabs become the majority in Israel, wouldn't it then become the kind of place that the ancestors of the Jewish Israelis fled from (for good reason)?
> The Jews didn't exactly jump from Judea as opposed to getting pushed:
> Dozens of countries around the world have had their Last Jews. The Libyan city of Tripoli was, astonishingly, one-quarter Jewish in 1941; today the entire country is Jew-free. After the fall of Muammar el-Qaddafi, who banished the country’s lingering Jews during his reign, a lone Libyan Jew came back to Tripoli and took down a concrete wall sealing the city’s one remaining synagogue. But he was soon forced to flee, having been warned that an antisemitic mob was coming for his head.
----
> Certainly there were always Jews (and Christians, and later Muslims) in that geographic area, but to say that Jews particularly 'deserve' exclusive governing of that area may be stretching it given the two thousand years of history since they last had 'exclusivity' to it.
I don't think it's a stretch. There's more to it than just historical tenancy.
> Palestinians also want a state of their own, but Israel is (according to some) squatting on their land:
Sure, but it would be yet another Middle Eastern Arab Muslim state. Why erase something unique for that?
> Palestinians also want a state of their own, but Israel is (according to some) squatting on their land:
> Don't both have a right (?) to exist? Why does Israel deny to others what it wants for itself?
Unfortunately, the world doesn't divide into nice neat categories that don't conflict.
No, and France does not have any laws whatsoever protecting its French character in this sense. The Jewish character of Israel does not refer to cultural character, but to ethno-relgious character. Israel very explicitly accepts democracy only insofar as it doesn't lead to Israel being led by people who are not ethnically and/or religiously Jewish.
The only other countries on Earth today that have anything similar to this type of language and laws are Hungary and, to a lesser extent, Russia (which both offer passports to foreign nationals of hungarian/russian ethnicity, for example).
I don't know the first thing about constitutional law in Israel but western basic sensibilities would be that this violates the principle of equality under the law.
This law has existed in different variations since 2002. This law is often challenged at Israel's Supreme Court, but the racist parties usually can get a majority vote in the Parliament to "tweak it" every time to get a few more months/years out of it before getting challenged again. Similarly to how several US states change abortion/voting/gun laws all the time, trying to see if they can beat SCOTUS.
This law, by the way, is unconstitutional* for more reasons than just the race-based discrimination. It defines different criteria for "permitted spouse" by gender, and has exceptions for specific religions (e.g. Druze).
*Israel doesn't really have a constitution, but there are certain "core laws" that the Supreme Court decided in the '90s that it can use as a basis to strike down other laws passed by the Parliament.
>This law has existed in different variations since 2002. This law is often challenged at Israel's Supreme Court, but the racist parties usually can get a majority vote in the Parliament to "tweak it" every time to get a few more months/years out of it before getting challenged again.
This is the same exact tactic used by the Anti-BDS proponents in the US. On the face of it the anti-BDS laws enacted in 35 states are blatantly unconstitutional.
There are two issues that have allowed them to stick around. First is the fact that it is much easier to pass a new law (however unconstitutional) than to repeal it and secondly as you alluded to, the tricks that are employed after the law is struck down is to tweak and alter the law to keep it on the books for a bit longer until the second version gets challenged.
For example in Abby Martin v. the State of Georgia the original law stated that for any contract up to 1,000$ there is an exemption to the law. While she won the ruling, the end result became that the law was amended to raise the certification exemption from $1,000 to $100,000. I am not sure if they are appealing the original ruling.
like what China is doing with the Uyghurs? Re-education and labor camps, forced migration, forced sterilization.
(not saying that's what you're advocating, just that that is one approach in use today, and given Israel's transgressions against the Palestinians I wouldn't be surprised if they were capable of that).
They do not want integration, because Israel is, according to law makers, only meant for one ethnicity that they aren't a part of. So integration is opposed.
Not likely to happen, I think. It would be construed as "antisemitic". But even apart from sanctions, Israel receives foreign aid and grants from the US.
Unfortunately true. It’s been darkly amusing to see the total absence of outcry when boycotts, divestments, and sanctions were decided against Russia, but somehow exactly the same thing is a crime against humanity when it’s against a segregated theocracy.
USA just passed omnibus 2022 $1.5T spending bill which has $250 Million for Israel iron dome upgrades.. there is a POWERFUL Israeli lobby in the USA that won't let such sanctions get off the floor.
Ultimately this is probably the key to change. As of yet Israel has had carte blanche to do what it wanted because the U.S. wants to have a proxy and looks the other way. Aid should be conditional on a sustainable solution, otherwise the U.S. is virtually complicit. This game of "we didn't make them do it" and showering them with cash and arms isn't fooling most people. I don't see how the country can go on pretending it doesn't have the capacity to strongly influence an outcome, it's just that the aggregate political will is not there yet.
Times are definitely changing. The situation in Ukraine, especially coming right on the heels of two years of lockdown that has disrupted the "status quo" worldwide, I hope is going to be the catalyst for the western world to find new unity with respect to our shared values and reevaluate many things. We've seen several watershed moments over the past few years completely eviscerate well-established and seemingly unassailable power structures more or less overnight.
their lobby is fairly organized and predatory and tries to make an example of anyone who disagree with them even Jewish people.
Ben and Jerry's ice cream (founded by Jewish Americans) decided not to sell ice cream in some disputed territories between Israel and Palestine and the lobby swiftly pushed Illinois and NY pension funds to sell all their holdings in their stock. Basically screwing with other people money for their power play.
“JAFFA, March 10 (Reuters) - Israel’s parliament on Thursday passed a law denying naturalization to Palestinians from the occupied West Bank or Gaza married to Israeli citizens, forcing thousands of Palestinian families to either emigrate or live apart.”
Abhorrent but not about preventing marriages, at least not directly
It is useful. Regardless of the virtue - or strong lack thereof - of the new law, the current headline here is misleading about what was actually passed.
I disagree that the current headline is misleading. If the substance of the article does not justify the headline in your view that's fine, but understand that most families consider being forced to remain separated to be a prohibition on being a family.
Does naturalization in this particular context confer citizenship with voting rights? I’m curious if blocking shifts in the electorate is a motive for this move.
Interestingly, the blurb talks about forcing families to split up. Does this law override permanent residency visas there?
"Can Non-Jewish People Settle In Israel?
Under the Law of Return, it is possible for non-Israeli family members of Israeli citizens to gain long-term residence status in Israel, including spouses/partners, children, and grandchildren, if they themselves are not Jewish.
Where a non-Israeli national is married to an Israeli citizen, they can initially acquire a temporary residence in Israel after six months. With this temporary status, they can then access the social welfare system in Israel, including healthcare. Citizenship is then possible after four years, however, the process for securing this is quite rigorous, as the Israeli immigration authorities want to be assured that the relationship is genuine.
Where a non-Israeli national is in a relationship with an Israeli citizen but they are not married (i.e. a civil partnership), it takes three years to gain temporary resident status in Israel. Permanent residence in Israel is possible after six years (as opposed to four for those who are married). However, those in a civil partnership cannot acquire citizenship, just permanent residency, regardless of how long the non-Israeli national lives in the country."
https://immigrationlawyers-london.com/global-mobility/perman...
And that's precisely because we stopped pulling this sort of crap in more and more places. 300 years ago, the number of religions and ethnicities currently existing in US or Western Europe would have meant a constant state of civil war.
>300 years ago, the number of religions and ethnicities currently existing in US or Western Europe would have meant a constant state of civil war.
300 years ago the Ottoman Empire was in full swing and quite religiously and ethnically diverse (probably more so than modern Europe or America). Not to say everyone had equal rights or was nice to each other, but historically a cornerstone for the success of many (not all) empires has been a significant degree of diversity and tolerance of both religions and ethnicity. It also wasn't new, Rome was also quite diverse and tolerant. (not always, not to everyone, but still quite so)
That's not true. Look at India - it has many times more ethnicities, and many Indian kingdoms used to have good relations even between Hindus and Muslims before modern times. Also, empires like the Ottoman empire had Turks, Arabs, Greeks, Persians, Jews and many other nationalities; and Muslims, Christians, Zoroastrians and other religions living in relative harmony - certainly not in a constant state of civil war.
Ancient empires were even more diverse, with civil wars often arising more along economic lines than ethnic or religious ones.
And before monotheism took over... well polytheistic societies don't really have "a religion" that is separate from other polytheistic religions. There are lots of gods and people focus on different ones. The next town over seems to have similar gods, but some of the stories are a little different and one or two has a different name... or is that a different god altogether. That town really far away talks funny, every god has a different name and some of them have wildly different stories, but a lot of it is still recognizable...
In other words, religious tolerance with polytheistic societies looks a lot different than the "my god/prophet vs. yours" which is much more prominent with monotheistic religions.
> How do you think the French would react to the import of Arabs
An Arab from Morocco would "import" to France - Morocco is an independent country. Israel does not recognize Palestine as an independent country but as territory belonging to Israel, and the IDF patrol the West Bank and haredi settlers create settlements there, in violation of UN resolutions.
Isn't this the dream of every revolution? Sure, to gain power, but also you give it back to who they hate. Also, all the people using the phrase "reverse racism" are wondering the same.
It looks to me like the powerful oppress the powerless, but power fluctuates among groups/nations.
I mean, this specifically has nothing to do with the Israeli situation. Israel isn't trying to "give it back" to anyone, and even if it was, the Arabs/Palestinians or whomever, are not the group that Israelis hate. (If there is such a group that would've made sense after hte war, it would've been the Germans)
You're right, I admit I had a long-standing misunderstanding about this - I had always assumed the word was referring to semitic people in general, but have decided to look this up (unfortunately after posting the above) and realized that's not the case...
You are allowed to say that a situation isn't black and white and still take a stance.
Magneto is a super relatable and his actions in the context of the mutant human conflict make total sense given his motivations -- he's also still a villain.
An oppressed people - the Jews, have become oppressors? This comment doesn't even attempt to draw the distinction between the government of Israel and the Jewish people. How would it feel if we said “The formerly oppressed Hispanic people have become the oppressors”, because one country in Central or South America has an oppressive government at some point?
There isn’t even recognition that the Israeli legislature might not be representative of most Jewish Israelis and instead be a consequence of political incumbents that are hard to unseat from power, like political dynasties in many countries.
Nor does it accept that even if this is the majority will of Jewish Israelis, there are plenty of Jews in Israel who disagree with the law (which is obviously true), and shouldn’t be lumped in as “oppressors”. The same way Trump and his followers actions shouldn’t impugn the moral character of all Americans.
No, this is a wholesale indiscriminate attack on Jewish people, global or Israeli. Purposefully vague and universal in it’s attack of an entire ethnic minority group There is no chance this comment isn’t xenophobic to it’s core.
he's mad (rightly so) because jews are being conflated with israel. but he should be mad against israel and influent jews around the world for pushing this skewed view of jewishness
Israel's government and it's supporters in the US and elsewhere ceaselessly push this equivalence between Judaism and Israel, with the clear intent to equate criticism of Israel with anti-semitism.
It funny that he head of the Palestinian party in the Israel coalition disagrees with you...
In my opinion what is interesting is that the oppressed people have preserved democracy in the face of constant war and even provided full right to the partly that 5 times attacked them, current coalition consists of Arab parties.
This law has nothing to do with intermarriage for Jews. That's effectively prohibited by other existing laws.
This law tries to prevent Muslims and Christians living in non-annexed occupied territories from marrying other Muslims and Christians living outside of Israel's effective control area.
You're right. I disagree with the policy myself but others are making it look like this would be abnormal. If they didn't have to pander to western ideals they could maybe implement a clean and painless definition of a border. Taking decades to colonize an area helps no one.
I support the right for Israel to exist and if they must expel the inhabitants of the land they have taken. But the mistreatment of palestinians is not acceptable by theirs or any other abrahamic faith.
This thread surprised me; I thought politics was off-topic on HN, at least for root articles - it seems to be OK in comments, as long as people don't get too angry.
Compared to what though? Reading some of the responses here, virtually no one has mentioned the fact that Israel's middle eastern neighbors, and more broadly, most of the Muslim world, are also oppressive ethnostates that treat Jews significantly worse. They don't need laws on the books to mistreat Jews, and we all know why.
We see more and more similar laws being passed in recent years, laws that are blatantly discriminatory. This may raise the indignation of many people, but in my opinion, Israel is shooting itself in the foot by passing these laws, because it reinforces the argument that it is an apartheid regime. Israel is slowly losing its support in the free democratic world where people believe in the inalienable universal rights of individuals and are less and less willing to turn a blind eye to such institutionalized racism.
>”How would Europeans react to the import of Arabs with the explicit intention of making Europe an Arab continent?”
Is this meant to be some theoretical gotcha? Firstly, anyone who believes in what you’ve quoted is soundly dismissed as a paranoid conspiracy theorist - a racist one at that.
Secondly, this strikes me as “you guys would pass the same law if you could get away with it”. But the main reason why this kind of law would never get passed in Europe is because it’s wrong and goes against human rights and the virtue of not discriminating based on race.
This fine article also says “It comes off as more xenophobic or racist (than other laws) because it’s not only giving extra rights and privileges to Jewish people, but also preventing certain basic rights only from the Arab population”.
People are opposed to it because it 1) codifies that an Israeli citizen’s race is an acceptable criterion for determining which rights they are entitled to, and 2) the law is a reactionary measure expressly designed to discriminate and maintain racial/ethnic composition. The people who voted for it aren’t even trying to hide it or dog-whistle it away: “"The State of Israel is Jewish and so it will remain," said Simcha Rothman of the far-right Religious Zionism party””
Any such law, anywhere, would be soundly denounced and repealed. Especially in Europe, which you had mentioned in your hypothetical question.
This is nothing new. Israeli law distinguishes between different religion groups and has done so since the formation of the country. Israeli Arabs, for example, are not forced to serve in the military. So are the Haredim (i.e. the strict Jewish sect). I'm part of the majority in Israel, but in many ways, I am getting screwed over more than other groups. In other ways, they get screwed over more than me.
I don't see the profit in trying to catch them on a small and clearly not meaningful technicality in their phrasing.
Genuine question, do you truly feel the commenter is a racist, and you just stepped in and called them out successfully?
What seems much more likely is that they, in their sarcasm, were doing an imitation of an ignorant conservative stereotype by focusing on skin color and grouping all middle easterners into a group. This seems fairly obvious to me - is that not how you're interpreting this?
This "brown people" phrase is commonly used to disparage concerns about incompatible values and cultural norms. And this is probably only context where I see middle easterners grouped like this.
Not GP, but I do consider this to be low-key racist and aaomidi to be somewhat racist, but maybe for different reason than GP.
I tried to explain why I decided to call out the use of that phrase, however my words failed me. So I’m editing my original (and inadequate) explanation to just say that the “brown people” thing is, to me, indicative of a deeper societal issue with racism and otherizing people that exists on both sides of the political spectrum.
Yes I would be okay in the hypothetical situation you've constructed, with loaded language and fear tactics.
I would also be fine with publicly shaming view points like yours and getting you fired from your job for being completely xenophobic. I can't imagine how you view your middle eastern coworkers who you've decided hate women and shit?
So you'd get me fired for my views, which by the way I extend to all nations regardless of race, but be totally welcoming to child abusers in your midst, because it's their culture? There's something very wrong with this fashionable double standard. And there's nothing hypothetical about my scenario, this has been playing out for decades in Europe and East Asia while legitimate concern from those who speak out is shallowly dismissed as xenophobia.
>fired from your job for being completely xenophobic.
Disapproving of very real cultural differences is not "xenophobia". Forcing women to cover themselves, limiting their independence, practicing arranged marriages and condoning physical abuse, my opposition to these practices stems from my western liberal ideals, not any sort of "phobia".
>I can't imagine how you view your middle eastern coworkers who you've decided hate women and shit?
That's because you are apparently unable to discern individuals from groups. A sane person can acknowledge that cultures have sets of typical practices/beliefs, but individuals may or may not share them.
The middle eastern coworkers decided it by following Islam. Islam is not an abstract theory, it is a very detailed book. It would be good to read it. Among other things, it explicitly demands to accept the whole of it to be a true Muslim. No cherry picking what fits our spiritual needs.
I don't personally have a problem with Arabs so take what I say with a grain of salt.
However, isn't what you're describing colonization? If the US or the UK announced a program of attempting to colonize 3rd-world countries, those countries would reflexively ban US immigration. Why the double standard?
You have no idea how wrong you are. Firstly, there is no "brown", everybody here has a range of skin colours. Your American ideas about race do not apply to this situation.
Secondly, in fact this is an Arabic speaking country. I personally speak Arabic, I learn from my Arab friends and neighbours. So everything that I'm mentioning is from the actual experience of living here and understanding both Western culture and the Arab culture (for the most part).
Thirdly, these people are going to have a dozen babies per wife no matter where the wives come from. And with the modern healthcare that everybody receives, all those babies will grow to be adults - something that was not the case when their culture developed the need to have a dozen babies per wife.
I don't blame you for not understanding, the media reports on the situation with no lies but eliminating perspective. If we had the same race issues as the US, and if "marriage" meant the same here as US audiences expect, then your rage would be justified. The task of mentioning these differences would fall on the body "reporting" the situation if the reporting goal were to spread information. But the spread of information is not the goal of the reporting - as evidenced by what information they include and what information they eliminate.
> We are not talking about loving couples being forbidden to marry.
According to the article, the law prevents first and only Palestinian spouses of Israeli citizens from becoming Israeli citizens, when love is the sole reason for wanting to marry. If Israel wanted to prevent citizens from having "third of fourth wives", an acceptable way would be to outlaw polygamy; if it wanted to prevent bogus marriages, an acceptable way would be by not granting marriage certificates when the couple don't know each other.
You are trying to apply Western ideas to the issue in order to understand it. That won't work.
> According to the article, the law prevents first and only Palestinian spouses of Israeli citizens from becoming Israeli citizens,
That is incorrect. The law makes no mention of Palestinian, Jew, Arab, Muslim, etc.
> when love is the sole reason for wanting to marry.
Your idea of what marriage is does not apply here. We are talking about people who have never met. In any case, marriage among the Bedouins is not about affection. Most marriages are between people who have never met. There is a good reason for that - the Saudis don't do this and they have inbreeding problems. The Beduins generally try to arrange spouses (yes, plural) from further away.
> If Israel wanted to prevent citizens from having "third of fourth wives", an acceptable way would be to outlaw polygamy;
Polygamy is already illegal, but again you are trying to apply Western ideas. These people do not recognize the state, and the state leaves marital affairs up to the religious leaders. So they continue to marry multiple wives. Many many laws do not apply and are not enforce with regards to the Beduins and Arabs in general. Mostly this is a non-issue.
> if it wanted to prevent bogus marriages, an acceptable way would be by not granting marriage certificates when the couple don't know each other.
There is no "marriage certificate", again you are applying Western ideas where they do no apply.
Is Israel losing its support? Hasn't quantifiable monetary support towards Israel been growing for decades?
Just look at the list of US allies and the kind of laws they pass, think of Arabia Saudi, a good US ally that had been tormenting Yemen for years now. Is the US population clamoring to stop collaboration with this country? Of course not, most people wouldn't know the first thing about this.
I think sometimes we overestimate how much governments are willing to do just because people are not fine with it, assuming they actually have any understanding of what's going on.
And if you meant moral support by the citizens of other countries I'm not sure how much Israel cares about that.
> if you meant moral support by the citizens of other countries I'm not sure how much Israel cares about that.
They care a lot. That's why they try so hard to counter pro-Palestinian sentiment with full-time paid propagandists, threat campaigns, media campaigns, smear campaigns, political bribes, getting people fired, attacking students and groups that support Palestine, throwing shit-fits at growing BDS campaigns, etc, etc, etc...
Yes, the US population is similarly quiet on the SA front - that's neither accidental or natural. Even then, it's crumbling.
> Hasn't quantifiable monetary support towards Israel been growing for decades?
Globally speaking, the US govt haven't really been on the side of the 'good guys' for decades. Realizing that, it doesn't make all that much sense to use their funding of evil regimes as any sort of justification, or reflection of the will of the general populace.
Has Isreal ever had enough popular support to justify the massive amount of aid it is sent? It has governmental support, I don't think it needs the popular support
'Israel is slowly losing its support' is a bit of a retelling... even in light of recent public and viral pro-Palestine support, Israel continues to maintain favorability among elected officials and people in America- in fact, favorability toward Israel has only increased since 2019[0]. And policies favoring Israel is not isolated to a federal level; many U.S. states force educators to sign agreements to not criticize Israel.[1] Indeed, I see Americans turn a blind eye to the horrors faced by Palestinians regardless of how many public figures correctly refer to Israel's actions as running the world's largest open-air prison.
Both things may be true. Jews and Evangelicals have a different view of Israel than ordinary Americans, most of whom pay it little mind.
Jews and Evangelicals generally support Israel, albeit for different reasons. Some are, as you note, increasingly unsure of that support, especially as it extends the rule of a government that is widely seen (not just by Israel's enemies) as cruel. But older Evangelicals have a nearly fanatical support of Israel -- including those same policies.
And in general, Americans see Israel as an ally in a turbulent Middle East. Their support for it will depend largely on their perception of Middle Eastern politics and our need for their support.
Jews are a small minority in the US. Evangelicals are a large minority. So you can get countervailing trends that end up making both what you said and what the GP said true.
I think this law will only hurt the Israeli image abroad a little bit. The 3 recent human rights reports (calling Israel out for practicing apartheid) are much more damaging.
This is really about the (internationally recognized) right of return of the Palestinians. To paraphrase Bill Clinton's advisor James Carville in 1992:
"It's demographics, stupid".
The 2003 law explicitly did not apply to residents of Jewish settlements in the West Bank wanting to marry and live with their spouse inside Israel, making it, and the ongoing policy underpinning it, blatantly discriminatory.
The thing to realize about this new law is that while it makes no mention of religion, it doesn't need to in order to add to the fragmentation of the indigenous people of the area. Non-Jews in the West Bank cannot now gain citizenship in Israel, if that was an avenue they had before, nor can they return to their villages (granted, almost all these villages within Israel have been destroyed so there's nothing to return to) or gain compensation for their loss.
(For a film adaptation of the 1949 novel by S. Yizhar called Khirbet Khizeh, search for the youtube version produced by Israeli Television in 1970 (and immediately banned in 1978 when it was released.))
I'm not sure why this outrages people in the US. Since 2002, Israel has adopted a policy of prohibiting Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza from gaining status in Israel or East Jerusalem through marriage, thus preventing family unification.
The Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law enshrined the policy in law between 2003 and its expiry in July 2021. The law barred thousands of Palestinians in Israel and East Jerusalem from living there with their Palestinian spouses from the West Bank and Gaza. Israel’s then interior minister stated the law was needed because “it was felt that [family unification] would be exploited to achieve a creeping right of return...”
This recent law just formalized and made permanent what was always there: the demographics is what's important here. When you look at Zionism as a colonial settler project, it's just part of "purity" laws and an essential part of apartheid.
> Israel is slowly losing its support in the free democratic world where people believe in the inalienable universal rights of individuals and are less and less willing to turn a blind eye to such institutionalized racism.
If using tanks against children throwing rocks or white phosphorus bombs over civilians didn't do it I doubt anything will. I'd recommend you to get in touch with a Palestinian and ask them about their life. Israel has been committing war crimes every now and then for decades, they're smarter than the Russians though, they do it bit by bit.
Talking about discrimination, don't read about their border control interrogations, if you have an arab sounding name, talked to a person with an arab sounding name or visited cities with a large arab population during your stay be ready to spend 4 hours in a small room with a few unpleasant people asking you about every single minutes of your trip.
I think it is not so much as Israel has discrimination, but about the region. By comparison to PA or other Arab countries there is very little discrimination in Israel. If the whole region is set on a path for pluralism that would also solve the problem in Israel.
> I think it is not so much as Israel has discrimination
It's one of the most discriminatory non third world country, if not the most. You literally have citizen of the same country treated differently depending on their last name and/or their religion, and worst than that, they don't even have the same rights.
It's not some "soft" racism like in the US where, in theory, everyone is equal in term of rights and in front of the justice, in Israel you have laws that only applies to non jewish people, they're not even trying to pretend, it's institutionalized and a source of pride
Israel/Palestine is similar to what's going on in Ukraine right now in many aspects but everyone seems to ignore that. It's just further away, happening slower and is committed by an historic ally.
Israel always had laws favoring jews over non-jews. It would seem shocking but its been like that since day 1.
Even now with white blue-eyed christian Ukrainians flooding Israel, they are being left in the airport for days, and interrogated to see who had a Jewish great grandfather and who did not. If you did - thats a free ticket in. If not? Wait a few more days, we might take you in if you put up collateral cash (around $3,000 per refugee). No money? you're put on a plane back to Poland. Only because your great grandfather was not Jewish
Its easy to twist this state of mind as racist towards 1 population. But there are rules that are just as hard on any non-jew. If you've ever met a Jewish Israeli who married a non-jew, they will tell you how complicated even visiting their parents on vacation with kids has become
Laws that make it illegal to sleep under bridges apply to everybody, not just the homeless. Does that mean a law against sleeping under bridges is not targeting the homeless?
It targets people who sleep under bridges. If, for example, there is a major safety hazard associated with sleeping under bridges, it would make sense to prohibit it, and it would be bizarre to criticize the law just because it affects mostly homeless people. If, on the other hand, the law prohibits only homeless people from sleeping under bridges, it becomes clear that the intent is discriminatory, and this becomes a valid criticism.
“There’s no need to shirk from the essence of this law. It is one of the tools to ensure a Jewish majority in Israel, which is the nation-state of the Jewish people. Our goal is for there to be a Jewish majority,” Lapid tweeted shortly before the law lapsed in early July. [0]
Yes — discussing the actual motivations for the law, as provided to us by Israeli politicians and previous Supreme Court decisions, is a good and valid starting point for discussion. Claiming that the law is bad simply because it disproportionally affects some subset of the Israeli population, is not. The argument I was addressing in this particular subthread is the latter, not the former.
Unfortunately politicians don't always tell you their true motivations.
These days I live in the Southeastern US. Since 2020 was a census year, states have been redrawing their electoral maps. Several states have made changes that reduce the voting power of non-white voters. If politicians say this had nothing to do with race does that make it true? Even if it is true that they didn't consider race at all in the decision making process, does that make it acceptable when the end result impacts people in a noticeable way based on their race?
I have seen this talking point repeated exactly in this manner all over Reddit. Was this dispatched from one of those Israel apps that navigate supporters to social media sites to push pro-Israel talking points?
Israel has many laws dictating where you can live and between which areas you can travel, and they depend on its complicated notion of citizenship and nationality. You have far fewer restrictions as a "Jewish nationality, Israeli citizen" than as "any other kind of nationality, Israeli citizen". This is the meaningful difference people are referring to when they say that "Israel is an ethnostate" or talk about "apartheid", because in many instances, in practice you can only do certain basic things like live with your partner if you are a "Jewish nationality, Israeli citizen".
Just to give a short (but relatively surface-level) proof that this distinction is real and meaningful in Israeli politics, you can read the most recent former PM's statements in the following link (and I would encourage reading a broad political spectrum of commentary on the various citizenship and nationality laws, in particular those passed in the last few decades, e.g., Nation-State Law): https://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Benjamin-Netanyahu/Netanya...
Can you provide an example of what restrictions non-Jewish Israeli citizens have? Because I’m pretty sure all Israeli citizens have the same rights (Al Aqsa mosque and other religious sites notwithstanding).
TFA is in practice an example, no? An Arab Israeli cannot marry and live with an Arab from occupied territory just "next door" (their affinity group), but a Jewish Israeli can marry from their affinity group and live anywhere (laws on marriage within Israel are restrictive and often prevent even Jews from marrying other Jews if they are not deemed officially Jewish, I think through matrilinear heredity, but if you are Jewish you can freely travel and marry outside the state and travel back to Israel and have the marriage legally recognized in full).
You might argue that technically this is targeting non-citzens and is therefore not affecting Israeli citizens of any nationality. But to me this is clearly targeted at limiting the normal actions of one group of citizens, while there are other laws to expand and accelerate analogous actions by another group of citizens. There are tens of thousands of Arab Israelis who have been married to non-Israeli Palestinians since 2003 when this law first went into place (the new law is just a law that regularizes a "temporary" "security" law that was renewed yearly until it surprisingly did not get support for yearly renewal in 2021). Those tens of thousands of families are in a very precarious situation, with a spouse with very limited rights to movement, and no rights at all if their Israeli citizen spouse were to die, etc. -- they would be deported (and I believe many have been).
Edit: Israel's interior minister has referred to the law's purpose in a way that shows the purpose is also to discriminate against the Arab Israelis and their ability to get married and have a normal family life: "we don’t need to mince words, the law also has demographic reasons": https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/shaked-family-unificatio...
As for more specific and direct examples, it is legal for the Jewish National Fund to refuse to sell or lease land to non-Jewish national Israelis (i.e., mostly Arab Israelis). The JNF is not public, but it owns a substantial percentage of Israeli land, about 13%, and I don't have information to hand, but I believe there are other bodies with similar practices that administer the majority of Israeli land in this way -- that's a hazy memory though, and I don't have time to research it again, so I wouldn't rely on it.
The Admissions Committees Law also allows for town committees to deny the right of Israelis to buy/lease land/property if they are deemed "unsuitable to the social life of the community [...] or the social and cultural fabric of the town", and allows for the cultural fabric of the town to be based on "special characteristics", such as defining themselves as having a "Zionist vision". This further means non-Zionist citizens are barred -- of course, many Jews in the world are non-Zionist or even anti-Zionist, but I don't think it's jumping to conclusions to infer based on the cultural backdrop that this is primarily a means to exclude non-Jewish nationals.
I think those two are specific examples of "legal" discrimination directly on the basis of non-Jewish nationality.
Ah, those are nice examples, but... some 50% of private land in Israel is owned by Arab Israeli citizens, not by JNF, and they apply similar restriction on any Jewish family trying to settle in a predominantly Arab town or village. A similar restriction doesn't apply to predominantly Jewish towns, only to small community villages.
I'm curious if you have any references, because as you can imagine, it's hard to search for such things.
I tried to make my statements and figures based on objectively verifiable information (the stated policy of JNF and its land holdings, naming the Admissions Committees Law). I think if you were to account for the broader discrimination in property sale/leasing, the amount of land where non-Jewish nationals are denied would be much higher than 13%, never mind counting the colonies in the occupied territories.
I would agree with you if you were saying that petty discrimination (done by individual land-owners) is widespread against all "nationalities", but the issue is that entire neighborhoods, communities, and territories have official sanction and support to be discriminatory against non-Jewish nationalities. And if you believe as I do that Israel must retreat to its border as defined by international law, and that it has in fact done the opposite and engaged in literal colonization for 60 years or so, then it would be plain to see why much of this conversation is besides the point. Of course there will be petty discrimination, perhaps even rooted in each side's belief that each property transaction is really a territorial battle. The actions of consequence are those of the state and those backed by the state apparatus.
>Currently, in Israel “proper” (within the Green Line), only 7 percent of the land is owned privately by individuals (3 percent Jews and 4 percent Arabs). According to the Israeli NGO Regavim, the rest is owned by the Jewish state (80 percent) and the Jewish National Fund (13 percent)
Thanks, but those figures weren't what I was asking about -- I do believe in their accuracy, and used a similar breakdown when writing my comment. I meant regarding the following:
> [Arab Israeli citizens owning private land] apply similar restriction on any Jewish family trying to settle in a predominantly Arab town or village. A similar restriction doesn't apply to predominantly Jewish towns, only to small community villages.
I'm not sure, because you clearly make a distinction between towns and small community villages, so I could be wrong, but it sounds like even there you are describing the (probably rampant) petty discrimination by individuals on 4% of the land. My default is also to assume there are comparable levels of petty discrimination on the other 3% of private land, unless you have some reference to support your comments about restrictions only applying in the other direction.
To repeat another point though, I am highlighting the rigidly enforced discrimination on at least 13% of the land, and think this is far more significant than haphazard petty discrimination on either side of the 4% and 3% private land divide, where creating or buttressing homogenous communities is far harder without state support (though one side does have that). Never mind that, like I said I don't have time to research it now, but I think a substantial portion of that 80% of state land has similar restrictions in place against non-Jewish nationals.
As I said:
> Of course there will be petty discrimination, perhaps even rooted in each side's belief that each property transaction is really a territorial battle. The actions of consequence are those of the state and those backed by the state apparatus.
To make clear the reasons for this:
- they cover a far greater proportion of the land
- they are far more rigidly enforced
- their power to engineer demography is far greater, as the instruments at their disposal are far more powerful (punitive travel/work restrictions, evictions, municipal infrastructure support/denial, military support/harassment, etc.)
The reason I make a distinction between towns and small villages is because Israeli laws only allow committee-based exclusion in small villages. Grow to the size of a town and anyone can move in (buying via third party if one is afraid of discrimination, if necessary). It would only face "petty discrimination" if it moves into a radical religious neighbourhood, but then the same would happen to a non-religious Jewish family.
However, if a Jewish family tries to move into a predominantly Arab town, it will be pushed out even if legally there is no exclusion. Yes, by illegal means if necessary. The petty discrimination levels are different in those two cases.
Regardless of the above, the majority of Israeli population (92%) lives in large cities, where every citizen can buy an apartment, and in most cases the construction companies are not allowed to discriminate at all.
Well I think there are ample cases that are in conflict with the idea that "anyone can move" into any Jewish neighborhood in larger towns and cities, and then you have groups like Elad in Jerusalem on top of that. https://archive.ph/20180614062757/https://www.haaretz.com/is...
I was just thinking that I should expand the point to illustrate what I mean when I saw your reply -- I wasn't clear. The article I posted is about the actions of the mayor, but I was using it as an example of petty discrimination, without explaining why.
The point I was indirectly making, was that there was vocal support from other Jewish Israelis in the area. It's highly probable that among those protesters, there are many such people where if they were selling their property, they would not obligingly sell to the best offer if it came from an Arab Israeli. My personal opinion is that there would be many who would not make the sale (there are also many many Jewish Israelis who would, of course). This one concrete case becomes in all likelihood many examples of the exact thing we're talking about.
I do agree that there are some judicial checks in place against some such cases.
Can you be specific? I’m reasonably sure this isn’t true. The only difference in how non-Jewish Israeli citizens are treated that I’m aware of is that non-Jewish citizens are exempt from conscription. I’m always open to learning more, however.
Otherwise, you seem to be talking about special legal carve-outs related to contested territories for restrictions on movement. The claim that non-Jewish Israel citizens are not allowed to live their partner is utter nonsense, unless by “live with” you mean “confer residency rights” but that seems like a dishonest framing.
Edit (responding to your edit): While that’s a shitty message and you can take issue with that (and related cultural issues in Israel), Netanyahu also notes that “Arab citizens have equal rights”. You’re actually asserting that this isn’t the case and need to explain how.
As for my framing and the question of "live" vs. "confer residency rights", I tried to be clear and say that my argument was about what restrictions are in place "in practice" and in the aggregate. If it is difficult for normal family formation and existence, and if that difficulty is for "demographic reasons", then that is discrimination on the Arab Israelis as well as their non-citizen spouses: https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/shaked-family-unificatio...
Israel is surrounded by Arab Muslims who outnumber Jews 100:1 and are overtly hostile to Judaism, as prescribed by their religion. I ask honestly, is it really so wrong for a nation to implement laws to preserve its culture, particularly when it's people constitute a tiny fraction of the global population?
Or is support of cultural preservation only virtuous when the alternative is labeled "gentrification"?
> and are overtly hostile to Judaism, as prescribed by their religion
As a biracial Jew from Pakistan I can assure you this is false. The modern enmity between Jews and Muslims began around the time of Israel's creation [1].
As far as 'preserving culture', this sounds a little to close to the Fourteen Words for my comfort. You can celebrate and keep alive one's own culture without the exclusion and denial of rights to others. I think the idea of ethnostates run counter to the core values of most modern, liberal democracies.
>I think the idea of ethnostates run counter to the core values of most modern, liberal democracies.
But not to the core values of middle eastern Arab countries, which is the point to limiting the possibility of a sizeable proportion of immigrants imposing their incompatible culture onto host nations.
>As far as 'preserving culture', this sounds a little to close to the Fourteen Words for my comfort.
There is no reason to presume that the values of your "modern, liberal democracies" will be maintained if there is no effort to preserve them. The rest of the world is far less concerned with your ideas regarding women's or LGBT rights. Allusions to the fourteen words are effectively a false equivalence, there is a massive range between maintaining a liberal way of life and going on a multinational genocidal war campaign.
>As a biracial Jew from Pakistan I can assure you this is false. The modern enmity between Jews and Muslims began around the time of Israel's creation [1].
The enmity is baked into the Koran and therefore approximately as old as Islam.
> But not to the core values of middle eastern Arab countries
Source, dearly lacking. Though I'm uncertain how you would support this claim. I tried digging up some examples, but the best I found was a list of countries [0] supporting 'right to return' laws with accelerated naturalization if you are of the 'favored' ethnicity. I don't see any arab or middle eastern countries on this list. I sincerely would appreciate any supporting articles you have towards this claim.
I agree liberal values must be defended. I just don't believe illiberal methods such as those described in the OP are effective methods of doing so. I think the world is growing more concerned with things like LGBT and women's rights in large part because of the freedom of exchange of information, ideas, and experiences. These are accelerated by both the internet and multicultural cities and nations which aren't possible with ethnicity-based immigration laws.
You're right I should not have alluded to the Fourteen Words, I could have picked a better example. The similarities in attitude frighten me, however. Elevating the safety and prosperity of ethnic group A to the detriment of group B is not promoting or maintaining a liberal way of life, despite what we might want to call it.
> The enmity is baked into the Koran and therefore approximately as old as Islam.
I won't rehash my previous response to this idea, but leave a hopefully unbiased wiki link [1] on the subject with just one small anecdote. The holiday of purim is an entire commemoration of the 'elimination' of a certain peoples. Does this mean a certain enmity is baked into the Torah towards Amalekites? Do you think this history actually gives you a negative bias towards the present day descendants of Hamman?
Nonsense. There are no end of examples of Muslim anti-semitism before the foundation of Israel. Just one example, the Grand Mufti of Palestine, Haj Amin al-Husseini, was a strong supporter of Hitler who frequently repeated the blood libel in his writing.
Cherry-picking individual quotes or statements does not reflect the attitudes of global Muslims as a whole. I'll instead link to the following wiki article, which is long, but here's a particularly relevant excerpt.
> Antisemitism has increased in the Muslim world during modern times. While Bernard Lewis and Uri Avnery date the increase in antisemitism to the establishment of Israel, M. Klein suggests that antisemitism could have been present in the mid-19th century.
> Scholars point to European influences, including those of the Nazis (see below), and the establishment of Israel as the root causes of antisemitism
That’s not what cherry-picking means. The previous comment made a claim. I gave a what I considered a valid counter example undermining that claim. That’s an entirely reasonable response.
Somewhat ironically, that Wikipedia article is cherry picking. It gives lots of examples that support its thesis and fails to mention or downplays counter examples, of which there are very many.
Of which you - contrary to the other commenter in the thread - failed to provide sources of.
You cherry pick one example and talk about there being many, many more. Yet it is the other side shows sources that you with few words "argue" are not valid - also without providing arguments, sources, anything.
I believe the concern here is whether a group of people who live in a state and are governed by its laws have equal rights and democratic representation, or whether they're treated as a lower class of citizen. I don't think citing cultural preservation, as important as it is, addresses those concerns.
> and are overtly hostile to Judaism, as prescribed by their religion.
What does the Talmud say about the Goyim?
>is it really so wrong for a nation to implement laws to preserve its culture, particularly when it's people constitute a tiny fraction of the global population
It's ok, natural and healthy for Israel, but not for the rest of the world, where that is nationalism and equates to ideologies of the 1930s.
> It's ok, natural and healthy for Israel, but not for the rest of the world, where that is nationalism and equates to ideologies of the 1930s.
You say that, but that's ridiculous. I can't become a citizen of any other country without that country's explicit permission, and many countries won't allow just anyone to immigrate.
Right, because the purpose of Israel is to be a Jewish state with a majority Jewish population to protect its Jewish residents from genocides, pogroms, blood libels, and other things that have been done to them for 2 millennia.
Wait, explain to me what we Jews should have done after the holocaust, and after many countries kicked out all their Jews. Doesn't starting a Jewish country make sense? There are dozens of other countries around different groups (whether religious or ethnic), how is it wrong for Jews to want the same thing?
Minority groups in Israel actually have less restrictions with regards to marriage than the majority. Minority groups have freedom of religion. I'm a jew by ethnicity but an atheist by religion. I do not have freedom of religion. If I wanted to get married, by law, I am forced to get approval from the Jewish Rabbinate and follow religious protocols that make my skin crawl. And my spouse must be Jewish too.
Not really. You could do what thousands of others do any take a quick trip to Cyprus, get married (regardless of your partner’s religion or sex), and have the marriage civilly recognized in Israel.
Does this law also need a yearly reauthorization? The makeup of the Knesset doesn't seem to have radically changed since the law failed in July, anyone know how this try suddenly got an overwhelming majority?
This is how the Middle East works by the way. Interreligious marriages are a very big deal and banned in every single Middle Eastern country.
The good countries will refuse to issue a marriage license to you, the bad countries will send the police to watch as a mob lynches you.
If you see Israel as some kind of psuedo-western state, then yea, you should be shocked. But as a Middle Eastern country, this is just another Thursday. Personally, I don't see Israel any different than I see Turkey, Egypt, or Jordan.(Allies that get lots of money from the US with questionable behavior)
edit: I think is wrong by the way, so not justifying. This is just how things work in the Middle East - where nations do terrible things in the name of preserving their "religious" identity.
This is not about inter-religious marriages - this is about Arab or Christian Israeli citizens marrying other Arab or Christian Palestinians (or Lebanese and and a few other countries). This is as if the USA denied the right to extend your citizenship to a Mexican spouse - in some ways worse than the inter-religious thing.
They can choose to label themselves however they see fit, however under the guise of israeli law they are no different and are treated the same way as "Arab muslims" which speaks to the enormity of the racist jewish laws.
And there are Arabic speaking Muslims who don't consider themselves Arabs (e.g. in north Africa), as well as Arabic speaking christians who are Arabs (e.g. in Iraq).
Happens with everyplace. Like when college kids go on their first overseas trip to Spain and come back talking about how "people in Europe" eat dinner late or are less prudish or whatever. As if Barcelona is just like Tallinn and Zagreb.
You're not wrong. At the same time, there was/is a long period in history (centuries?) where "Christian" used as a general moniker that was more nationalist than religious. "The Christian world" etc.
Similarly, not all Christians in Israel or Ghaza are Arabs (though the vast majority are). I didn't want to list all somewhat significant ethnic minorities, so I thought Arab (Muslim, Christian, Druze, etc) + (non-Arabic) Christians (including Armeneans, Arameans, Copts, Assyrians and many other small groups, together making up something like 10k people)
> this is about Arab or Christian Israeli citizens
This is incorrect. There is no distinction in the law between Arab Israelis and Jewish Israelis. The law applies equally to Israeli Jews who wish to marry a resident of the WB/Gaza, or one of the other countries mentioned in the law.
It would be interesting to see the ration between the Arab Israelis wishing to marry an Arab from WB/Gaza and Jewish Israelis wishing to marry a Jewish from WB/Gaza. Laws make sense in a context of a society.
There is a fundamental difference between a law that prohibits a specific ethnicity from doing X, and a law that prohibits everyone from doing X, but a specific ethnicity/minority is more affected by it than others. The former is pretty much never legitimate, while the latter is often unavoidable, and I imagine exists to some extent in any country with minorities.
This law very explicitly discriminates against non-Jewish Palestinians (and Lebanese and a few others). It also disproportionately affects Israeli Arabs and others who are much more likely than Israeli Jews to have spouses who would be discriminated against by this law.
Are you trying to say that there's something inherent to the Jewish population that they're less likely to marry a non-Jewish person than a Muslim is to marry a non-Muslim?
An arab israeli is very likely to marry an arab from Palestine. I'm guessing a number close to zero Israeli Jews are looking to marry an arab from Palestine (religion, hate, etc).
No. They're saying that a Jewish Israeli citizen is less likely to marry a Palestinian than a Muslim Israeli citizen. And given public statements from the lawmakers advocating for this law, they agree.
I am not sure, where you draw that conclusion from, but yes that would be correct.
Because the jewish religious law (which many jews have to follow to peer pressure, even if they are not religious by themself) explicitely forbids marrying non jews and no one can convert to the jewish religion.
Muslims on the other hand can marry non muslims, but are supposed to convert them. So this is indeed way more comon.
Ok, it seems I have been wrong about this as a general statement and liberal (or even most?) jew movements indeed consider it possible.
Last time I checked - it seems I read a viewpoint from a rather orthodox rabbi (but his article was the first one, that showed up in google at that time, now I cannot find it anymore), which clearly stated, this is not possible at all, with no exception.
The only way, would be to recognized as a "lost jew", meaning being of jewish origin, who lost connection to the tribe (even some generations ago). And the recognition would need years of devotion.
Maybe that is the case with some small, insular sects of Orthodox Jews? Some of the groups among those often referred to as the "Ultra Orthodox" - I don't know.
It is not aligned with the vast majority of Jewish views about conversion to Judaism.
In general, conversion is possible. As far as I can tell there are even clearly-enough defined requirements.
Jews are not supposed to treat converts any differently than non-converts. People being people, this doesn't always happen, but that is the reasonable principle.
Given that Jews for centuries have not proselytized to non-Jews, many believe you cannot convert to Judaism. You can.
I really cannot find that article anymore, but yes, it seems it must have come from an ultra ultra orthodox section and who knows why it ranked number 1 on google at that time (some years ago), fooling me. Because apparently yes, you absolutely can convert to judaism. It just isn't easy, like it is with other religions.
> The law applies equally to Israeli Jews who wish to marry a resident of the WB/Gaza
There is no problem for Israeli Jew to marry a resident of WB/Gaza who is also Israeli Jew. This happens all the time (except Gaza, no Israeli Jews live there).
Concept of Israeli Jew marrying a non-Jew (no matter the residency) doesn't exist in Israeli law.
The state may (but not obliged to) recognize the marriage registered abroad.
For non-Muslim non-Israeli spouses of Israeli Jews there is a 5+ year naturalization procedure where outcome is not guaranteed and every half a year one has to recount all the spots and birthmarks of significant other in front of state official to prove the marriage is not a fake.
This specific law is for Muslim non-Israeli spouses. Instead of 5+ year procedure it's just a firm "No".
There are plenty of Christian and Muslim citizens of Israel, and plenty of Christian and Muslim Palestinians, so the marriages don’t have to be inter-religious.
Inter-religious marriages are already impossible in Israel, and have been AFAIK forever (but you can fly to e.g. Cyprus to have one performed and it will be recognized in Israel).
> "The State of Israel is Jewish and so it will remain," said Simcha Rothman of the far-right Religious Zionism party, a member of the opposition who brought the law forward with Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked. "Today, God willing, Israel's defensive shield will be significantly strengthened," he told the Knesset hours before the vote.
There is something about being surrounded by people who actually want you dead that makes you somewhat rigid about instituting measures intended to keep you alive. I'm not arguing rights and wrongs, here. Merely human psychology.
Israeli right-wingers don’t see Palestinians as a persecuted minority in a vacuum. They see them as members of the Arab ethnicity of the surrounding states which are much larger in size and population. In the late 1960s Syria and Egypt actually formed into one state and tried to annihilate and absorb Israel in a pincer movement. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Arab_Republic
One thing that stood out to me when reading about the Rwandan genocide was that Madeleine Albright—who lost three grandparents to the Holocaust and was touted as being humanitarian in part as a result—was center of the US' diligent refusal to acknowledge the genocide they were watching unfold, and recasting of the Genocide Convention as merely allowing intervention in genocide. (It obligates intervention.)
Less than a year after the Holocaust Museum in DC opened its doors, proudly declaring "Never Again".
Funny enough, the Holocaust is the exact reason that these sorts of things are justified. It isn't out of malice, but out of a perceived need to protect themselves from the possibly of it EVER happening again. The collective trauma of being exiled from numerous European countries, the progroms in Russia and having ~6 million of your people systematically murdered in Germany overrides any guilt for infringing on intermarriage rights of people who aren't exactly your closest allies and continue to . I don't support the law, but it is important to understand the broader context in which it is passed and the purpose of the state of Israel to those that live there.
Not really commenting about the law. But as an arab from a country that Israel has tried to unsuccessfully invade about 3 times now.
We had nothing to do with the holocaust. Germans and their friends were complicit.
Im genuinely interested in how come normal
people of the world don’t really flinch at what Israel was allowed to do and what it keeps doing.
I don’t blame Israelis who were born there since we have little control over where we’re born and how we’re raised.
Apologies for the rant, but why does it make sense in the broader context to allow israeli actions that directly cause palestinian suffering if all of the jews’ suffering was caused by the germans?
What you say is true but it is also true that the religious minorities in Israel don't amount for much when it comes to the law. Israel's 'religious right' (the ultra-orthodox parties) have a lot of influence over marriage law in particular.
ultra-orthodox are not right wing, in general they are apolitical and will join any type of coalition as long as they get the budget for their community.
I would assume most of these aren’t interreligious, but beetween Israeli Arab Muslims, and Palestinian Muslims.
As far as being banned in every Middle Eastern country… not true. I know a few Bahraini females married to Brits. Interracial and interreligous. In Lebanon, and Jordan, this happens between Christians and Muslims as well. Which countries would lynch you?
The world was very different a couple of generations ago, let alone the hundred years you're talking about. You'll be shocked to hear what happened 20 years later.
There is no law banning inter-religious marriage in Lebanon either.
What different churches and such allow in terms of inter-marriage is left up to them, just like in, say, the US. But no laws prevent religious intermarriage.
FWIW, this law is not banning marriage, rather it's preventing Palestinians from becoming automatically naturalized citizens through marrying an Israeli citizen.
That's the point. There is no path to becoming "naturalized", a legal resident or much more-so a citizen in your own country - whether you see that as Palestine or Israel. This is just one more mechanism to humiliate a population of millions.
Of course nobody cares that an Israeli Jew marrying a Lebanese, or a Jordanian, or an Egyptian, let alone a Saudi citizen, can't get Lebanese or Jordanian or Egyptian or Saudi citizenship.
But Israel must give citizenship to everyone... right?
Main problem here that if Israeli citizen will decide to marry a Lebanese, or a Jordanian, or an Egyptian or even Saudi citizen, they won't be able to live in Israel.
Outrage of non-Israelis about is law is merely academical. Outrage of (some of) Israelis is practical: the state is putting a choice in front of a citizen -- be able to marry a person you want or be able to live in Israel.
Because I'm not a citizen of Lebanon, Jordan or Egypt. As an Israeli citizen I share the responsibility and am obliged to react to any colonial era exercise the government is trying to pull off.
This is happening between Palestinians. You can call them Arab Israelis if you want but they still identify as Palestinians. Splitting them up for the sake of division with these policies is political and systematic.
And yes a double standard applies compared to other countries because Israel identifies as a western liberal democracy whereas the others don’t or no one implies that they seriously are.
> This is how the Middle East works by the way. Interreligious marriages are a very big deal and banned in every single Middle Eastern country.
Just to put some extra emphasis on quite how wrong this is: they are likely banned in almost no Middle Eastern country. Source: Married a woman from and in a Middle Eastern country under heavy sanctions just a few years ago.
Ironically, the law in question is not about the legality of the marriage, but about the rights of getting citizenship afterwards, and indeed, I would not be able to become a citizen of this country by way of my marriage, so in that sense, it is similar.
It is absolutely right. Want to look up what the legal stance in Egypt of an Egyptian Christian Male married a Muslim Woman? (even if she isn't Egyptian)
Unless Iran is not in the Middle East, you're 100% wrong about Iran. Lots of people I know married (officially in Iran) to their Iranian spouse from other religions.
Right, but a large number of Palestinians are Christian. The law doesn’t seem to apply to a Jewish Israeli who marries an American Christian, only a Jewish Israeli who marries a Palestinian.
This is simply not true. While Inter-religious marriages are often frowned upon, no law prevent any person from a middle east country to marry another person on the basis of different religious background. Please give your sources.
Egypt has a lynching every 3 month or so because of an inter-religious relationship[0]. Lebanon had a religious civil war a generation ago, and would probably end up in another one soon if things continue as they are.
Please explain how the #23 ranked country in the democracy index(higher than countries such as Italy, Spain and the US) and the #24 highest GDP per capita(higher than UK, France and South Korea) is not more of a western country then authoritarian regimes like Jordan, Turkey or Egypt?
Israel has one of the largest pride parades in the world (300k+ people) and equal rights for LGBTQ people. Please look up what happens to the LGBTQ community in the countries you mentioned.
Israel is a western country with western values and allies, we just have a very hard and not so easy to solve as people on HN think issue with the Palestinians which I hope would be solved some day in our lifetime
What does the ultra-Orthodox Jews think about those parades?
Just by the demographics alone, those guys will be in charge very soon. (or Israel will cease to be democratic).
So yes, Israel is not there yet, but well on its way. (and I have no problems with that, as long as they don't try to impose their religious values on me).
As an atheist-jew living in Israel, I will be the first to denounce ultra-orthodox Jews living in Israel and their chosen lifestyle, and I truly hope they won't ever become a majority here. But like you said, until then- It's a western country with western values through and through
No it isn't. In my country religion has no impact whatsoever in who you can marry or your citizenship.
Israel is not "just like us". It is a country founded on a religion. It treats that religion as superior and grants it more status.
To be harsh Israel is more like KSA and Iran.
Actually, it's not quite that. Israel doesn't issue marriage licenses in the first place--they leave marriage up to the various religions. A Jew can't marry a Muslim in Israel because neither of their faiths will permit it.
>Some Knesset members said it was intended to prevent a gradual right of return for Palestinian refugees who were driven from their homes or fled during the 1948 war surrounding Israel's creation
Who said that? Why are these "some Knesset members" not named? Is this an actual explanation provided by proponents of the law, or hyperbole said by the opponents (e.g. Arab parties)? Or bullshit invented by the jounalist?
This article doesn’t really provide much in the way of explanation for why this law is being enacted. Here [0] is a better article that quotes supporters and objectors to the law.
It includes the (IMHO not very convincing) figures that "Between 1993 and 2003, around 130,000 Palestinians were given Israeli citizenship or residency through family unification, including children, according to court filings. The Shin Bet security service told the Knesset on Monday that between 2001 and 2021, about 48 were involved in terror activities.”
48 of 130,000 amounts to 0.037% being involved in terrorist activities which seems very low to be used as justification for a law around security.
From your source: "Israeli politicians say the law is both an essential security measure to prevent Palestinian terror attacks and a means of preserving a Jewish majority in Israel."
Maybe it's more of an immigration policy than a security policy?
Does it have to be? Does it operate a gas pipeline that heats Germany, or something? Is it an irreplaceable source of titanium? A major wheat exporter? Is the West planning to use it as a launchpad for a war of aggression in the region?
> Is the West planning to use it as a launchpad for a war of aggression in the region?
Pretty sure this was the reason. It’s a tactical piece that they want to keep control over. Everyone else in the region hates them (and rightfully so).
they mean the west has systematically overthrown governments, strip-mined the natural resources, drawn arbitrary country borders, funded extremist groups, bombed civilian populations, gone to war because the extremists they originally backed got too strong, etc etc in the Middle East for generations
then if all else fails, they do sanctions, which of course NEVER affect the ruling class, they merely provide the rulers a tool to point more hatred at the west - you think it's the ruling class that can't get diabetes medication due to sanctions? No of course not, it's the average person.
In the comment to which I replied, "them" refers to Jewish Israelis ("Everyone else in the region hates them"). Jewish Israelis are Middle Eastern, not part of the West.
It will not happen as long as there exists a strong pro-Israel lobby in the US.
Israel passed on confidential US military technology to China and abstained in the Security Council resolution against Russia. That's not the behaviour of a strong ally.
's/so long as Israel is a strong western ally/so long as being "insufficiently pro-Israel" makes it difficult to gain or retain elective office in most Western democracies/g'
> as we have learned over the past few weeks, sanctions are an effective means of pushback
Not really. The war in Ukraine is intensifying. Russia sees the sanctions regime as an act of war. I'm not sure what the off ramp would be, and I generally support the sanctions. But I don't think your conclusions are sound. Pushback? Yes. Effective? Not so far.
As someone born and raised in South Africa that lived there until the end of 2019 I really wish people would stop comparing Israel to the old government in ZA.
The Israeli government definitely does a ton of problematic stuff that is objectively awful but it's just not quite the same as what the old government in my country used to do.
I am sure I will get downvoted for this, but the situation with Israel/Palestine is not quite the same as what existed in South Africa for a significant chunk of the 20th century. That doesn't mean it's a nice situation but really, I just would prefer it if people would stop trying to weld one shitty piece of history to another one to try and create this weird equivalency between the two.
Is there a better analogy to compare the situation to? Language is about communicating ideas efficiently. Apartheid is a good word for what is happening, and our response should be the same as it was in South Africa.
My understanding is that, once you're a citizen of Israel, you have the same rights as other Israeli citizens, regardless of race or religion. Under apartheid, rights were infringed based on race.
In South Africa you could be a citizen regardless of your race, but how you were treated depended on your race; citizens were not equal.
In Israel, they are trying to prevent people of a certain race from becoming citizens, but once you are a citizen, there are fewer 'official' racist policies even if a lot of the people you have to deal with are outwardly racist anyway. On paper, citizens are (largely) equal.
But is it really so different if we replace race with religion? Israel doesn't recognize people who join the religion- it's effectively based on birth just as much as race.
We have a government over a people that determines the rights of each person based on who their parents were. That's the core concept that I, for one, am opposed to.
>But is it really so different if we replace race with religion?
They aren't completely replacing race with religion, many Palestinians are black and my understanding is Israel is quite racist towards its black Jewish population as well. European Settler colonialism has historically been quite racist.
How many and what % of Palestinians are black? How many and what % of Israelis are black?
By black do you mean having darker skin tones?
If so, many Jewish Israelis are black - as are many Palestinians - and not just those that came to Israel from Ethiopia. Also, many Israelis are white (as in light skinned) as are many Palestinians.
The average Israeli is Mizrahi (of North African / Middle Eastern origin).
I'm not sure why you think any of this is relevant to the point being made, but since you seem to be actually ignorant of the matter: blackness is a racial identifier, not a matter of skin tone. Skin tone is certainly part of racialization, but regardless of how dark or light someone's skin is, they may or may not be racialized as black, and therefore may or may not be subject to anti-black racism.
Apartheid doesn't mean "Identical to South Africa". Apartheid is a crime against human rights defined as such:
Apartheid refers to the implementation and maintenance of a system of legalized racial segregation in which one racial group is deprived of political and civil rights. Apartheid is a crime against humanity punishable under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. ACADEMIC TOPICS. legal history.
There are a couple of arguments that might be presented to explain how affirmative action is different to apartheid.
1) affirmative action does not remove any rights of those groups not targeted by affirmative action. It is possible to argue that by supporting one group, you are implicitly disadvantaging the out-group, but usually this distinction is important. E.g. having a "ladies night" at a bar is generally more acceptable than a "men pay double price" night.
2) affirmative action policies tend to target education and employment. The right to vote is typically is given higher priority when it comes to balancing different rights.
3) Affirmative action can be seen as targeting equal outcomes, not equal treatment[1]. My country offers free breast cancer screening to all women above a certain age. Men can certainly catch breast cancer, but it's far more dangerous to women, so a gender-blind outcome of "we want less people to die of breast cancer" has a gender-aware policy implementation. Most people wouldn't say that this policy is "medical apartheid" on the basis of gender. Similarly, you could say that affirmative action is about getting disparate groups to have equal outcomes in terms of whatever metric you care you measure (educational attainment, income, etc)
[1] not everyone agrees with this. Some people argue that preferential treatment should be given to groups that were historically persecuted (e.g. land confiscation), as remediation.
I feel this is a reaction to various PA policies. In PA, there is a law that selling land to Israelis is punished by death. In Gaza, Hamas declaration of principles states that the goal of Hamas is to destroy the state of Israel.
If you're referring to the Russia Ukraine conflict with note about sanctions I don't think we've seen indication that sanctions are an "effective means" of pushback considering the fact that the Russia continues to wage war against Ukraine.
The Palestinians who stayed in Israel during the Israeli war of independence became citizens. The ones who left, did not. They were also not part of Israel for almost 30 years, they were refugees of other countries, who then attacked Israel.
They have never been Israeli citizens, and were not even in Israel for many years before they became Israeli refugees.
(Whether they should have been granted citizenship when the lands were annexed as part of the war, or not, is a different question)
Honestly I'm really confused every time I try to understand Israel. Ordinary terms like citizenship, borders, immigration, and statehood are all in dispute. Then that makes it hard to define "democracy".
I tried reading about the history of Palestinian nationality on wikipedia, and I have as many questions as answers. Are they Jordanian, Egyptian, Palestinian, or Israeli? Are some Palestinians stateless?
I'm no expert, but I can give you my perspective (Background: I'm Israeli, and consider myself fairly liberal politically).
> Honestly I'm really confused every time I try to understand Israel. Ordinary terms like citizenship, borders, immigration, and statehood are all in dispute
I'm not sure what you mean by in dispute here. Most of these are fairly well-defined when it comes to Israel. They're not even unique definitions - Sweden is the state of the Swedish ethnic group, Germany of Germans, Japan of the Japanese, etc. Israel in its conception is the land of the Jews.
There are complicating factors, which is that history you alluded to. While it certainly seems from the wiki article that the "historical Palestinian national identity" is something that is still argued about, I think the relevant part isn't so controversial.
Around the mid-19th century, the land that is now Israel (and was back then referred to as Palestine) had mostly Arab inhabitants, with a small Jewish population. Jews around the mid-19th century started a plan to go back to the lands they were removed from two thousand years prior - and many Jews started (legally) immigrating to Palestine and buying Palestinian lands. This caused there to be a fairly large Jewish population by the time 1948 came around.
Between 1900-1948, that land changed hands several times, eventually ending up under the rule of the UN, which made a plan to divide the land into a Jewish country and a Palestinian country. The Palestinians refused, and fled the land, as several Arab countries decided to attack Israel. Here there is some disagreement - were the Palestinians encouraged to flee by their leaders? Were they pushed out of Israel? Those are more disputed facts (I think for sure, some of both things happened.)
Israel won that war, effectively cementing most of modern day Israel, minus some (fairly large) territories. The Palestinians that stayed in Israel and didn't flee, became Israeli citizens. The hundreds of thousands of Palestinians that did flee became refugees in other countries.
Then the Six Day war happened. (Israelis generally consider the war to be started by others, though this is certainly disputed.) During this war, Israel took a bunch of extra territories, and with it, the Palestinian refugees. However, Israel didn't officially annex the regions or give the refugees citizenship, rather, kept them (and still to some extent keeps them) as refugees.
I think that's the majority of the story, from a (definitionally) Israeli perspectiev.
That a 0.37% (or more) slice of some population that feels it's been oppressed and impoverished might engage in /(freedom fighter|terrorist)/ activities doesn't seem surprising to me.
Not sure what you mean by this. There's not a current, similar situation in the US where the average US citizen feels like they were recently displaced/oppressed/etc by occupiers. That's been the situation in the past with Native Americans, slave populations, the American revolution, etc. I suspect the numbers met that threshold then.
It's not a good faith premise since the whole of the USA population isn't in a similar situation currently. If it were, then I would expect at least 100k, yes.
"being involved in terrorist activities" is pretty poorly defined. In the US at least that could amount to charitable giving that accidentally finds its way to the orphans of suicide bombers.
1. Are Israeli figures to be trusted? There are countless - literally countless - of examples of abuses and arbitrary detention from the state. Including detention for “terrorism”.
2. What qualifies as “terrorism” in their book? Does throwing a rock at the IDF qualify as terrorism?
3. Why is Israel providing citizenship in the first place? What brought them to such an authoritative position? Who are the people they are giving citizenship to, where are they coming from, what were they subjugated to, why are they seeking citizenship in this place? The answers to these questions lie somewhere between Israeli far-right governance, oppression, human rights abuse and land imprisonment of a population who were kicked out of their homes and left stateless, passportless, and immobile, unable to cross their borders and travel, left to take long treks through abusive barriers and routes just to make it 5 miles from one place to another. Whose water is shut off, food supplies are limited, and have no economic prosperity. So why are these people the way they are, and seeking citizenship in such a place?
The book of Ruth in the Hebrew bible tells the story of ~5th century BCE Israeli refugees to neighbouring Moab. The story is repeated in the old testament in the Christian Bible. In Moab, the son marries Ruth, a local Moabite woman. Even though the son dies, when conditions in Israel improve, Ruth agrees to return to Israel with her mother-in-law. Another Moabite woman who marries another of the sons refuses the opportunity to leave Moab for Israel.
As the Book of Ruth makes clear, Ruth herself was a formidable woman. From her descended famous Israeli offspring such as King David, King Solomon and, if you are Christian, Jesus Christ himself.
733 comments
[ 4.5 ms ] story [ 346 ms ] threadWestern countries apply their moral principles differently to their allies.
Maybe, but not one of nearly the same strategic importance (and lobbying/PR prowess) as Israel.
West didn't ignore apartheid, they quietly supported it, because USSR supported Mandela and anti-apartheid struggle. Kinda "enemy of my enemy is my friend".
IMHO that was the stupidest position of the US, they should've "united" with USSR on anti-apartheid position.
That is why the west supported some terrible regimes, including Apartheid South Africa and Pinochet in Chile. Because they could claim to be "anti-communist".
The new regime in south Africa has some nostalgia for the assistance offered to them by the USSR back then, that is why they abstained on the vote on UN resolution against Russian attack on Ukraine.
In some ways it was a proxy war.
That is irrelevant ancient history. What matters is that they continue expanding their occupation (building new settlements, passing new discriminatory laws, etc.) today.
A 1:1 scenario would be if Ukraine invaded Russia and then Russia took control over Ukraine territory, which in that case i'd argue the outcry would be minimal.
What matters is that Israel is maintaining their illegal occupation even today, and even expanding it (building new settlements, etc.)
The annexation of the Golan Heights is somewhat justifiable on strategic grounds. The occupation of the West Bank is a land grab, pure and simple.
But you’re mischaracterising the strategic importance of the West Bank. If it was a sovereign nation, the logical thing for the West Bank government to do would be to place artillery on the high ground near Israeli cities. The artillery would be sufficiently protected and would be capable of causing widespread destruction. That’s powerful negotiating leverage, even if the artillery isn’t used. This is similar to the state Seoul is in - within range of NK artillery.
That’s why there is no 2 state solution the Israelis will agree to where the Palestinian state operates its own military. It might be morally right, but it would be a death sentence for Israel.
Source - Prisoners of Geography by Tim Marshall.
Not that my opinion makes any meaningful impact on global scale, but I do at least vote with wallet and don't buy any Israeli products. I respect their military prowess but I have much higher moral expectations from place I will anyhow support with my money.
That's a massive exaggeration.
It would theoretically be a risk for Israeli citizens living close to the border, but would lead to an overwhelming punitive response from the Israeli army, strongly backed by America.
Israel has by far the most capable military in the region, routinely inflicts casualty ratios of 10-20:1 in its favour in any conflict with Palestinians, and is backed by the most powerful military in the world.
The threat posed by an independent Palestine would be negligible. However the spectre of that threat is used to justify the continued occupation and expropriation of the West Bank.
But artillery still exists. And if the enemy has the high ground and the cities are in the plains, the death toll will be in the tens of thousands before victory is achieved.
This is the reason every citizen in Seoul knows where the nearest bomb shelter is. I can understand (but not condone) someone wanting to avoid that fate.
It's really hard to imagine a two-state solution working, when leading Israeli politicians repeatedly declare that Israel consists of all the land between the Jordan and the sea. And even if it could be agreed, Israel would remain a segregated state. A single state with one-man one-vote would quickly put an end to apartheid, and to many of the most serious complaints of the Palestinians.
The argument against a single-state solution is that it would put an end to the idea of a "Jewish homeland". That is true; but a "Jewish homeland" must necessarily be an apartheid homeland, which discriminates against non-Jews.
If the territory had been annexed and put under civilian law and everyone there had been given Israeli citizenship 60 years ago, I would indeed agree that although that was bad, it’s not worth crying over spilled milk in the present day, much like e.g. the British conquest of Quebec. But that’s not the case. It remains a military occupation and bad stuff continues to happen, today.
Not quite...
I know, that's exactly what England did under Cromwell; one of my ancestors was such a settler.
9/11 didn't happen out of the blue, it was a response to american foreign policy in the middle east.
The troubles didn't happen because the IRA thought British rule was legitimate
Etc.
The vast majority of terrorism is because one group is controlling a region that the other group thinks they should not.
In my opinion, most long running conflicts tend to have both sides doing terrible things over the course of the conflict, so its rare there is one side that is "good" and one that is "evil".
If you don't consider the details of the situation, the comparison basically becomes so vauge as to be useless.
As a strictly emotional thought, this makes me feel Israel is a country to cozy up to the strongest nation at the time. If the US falls from grace Israel will have no problem ‘switching’ sides to Russia.
Which is equivalent to an $800 tax break the US gives the Israeli citizens each year.
"Israel Passes U.S. Military Technology to China" [1]
"a 2013 National Intelligence Estimate on cyber threats “ranked Israel the third most aggressive intelligence service against the US” behind only China and Russia" [2]
"Israel among the U.S.’s most threatening cyber-adversaries and as a “hostile” foreign intelligence service." [3]
"Israel’s snooping upset White House because information was used to lobby Congress to try to sink a deal" [4]
[1] https://www.military.com/defensetech/2013/12/24/report-israe...
[2] https://www.timesofisrael.com/new-nsa-document-highlights-is...
[3] https://theintercept.com/2015/03/25/netanyahus-spying-denial...
[4] https://www.wsj.com/articles/israel-spied-on-iran-talks-1427...
How a so called ally can perform such levels of espionage and the US has a hand in paying for their own ‘downfall’. I suppose the only reason Israel gets away with it is due to the influence Israel has on politicians with AIPAC/lobbying efforts.
"NSA tapped German Chancellery for decades, WikiLeaks claims"
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jul/08/nsa-tapped-g...
Though, I do disagree with spying on allies. There is a history with Germany that may have given credence to the wiretapping.
With that said, the US is not giving Israel weapons to China. But, Israel has given US tech to China (and likely will again).
That's in line with Israel's priorities, which first and foremost is its own survival.
At lot people kind of lazily expect Israel to act like your typical invincible Western state, but it's pretty vulnerable. It's also probably acutely aware of that fact, since within living memory all its neighbors vowed to destroy it and nearly did so.
Citation needed. A strongly held opinion isn't a fact.
> Instead they will not supply anything more than medication. The US gives Israel plenty of military $ for them to share in times of need.
They have or are going to have a field hospital, and have given aid to Ukraine and surrounding countries.
Israel is a US ally. Israel would be strategically harmed by pissing off Russia (they depend on Russian good will to stop Iranian spread of weapons to Syria and Lebanon). And for what - symbolic gain alone?
It's pretty obvious what the Israeli government and population generally seem to think about Russia's actions (as it is obvious what the Chinese government and Chinese population generally seem to think, another country that's trying to stay more "on the fence" but clearly supportive as opposed to Israel that is clearly not supportive).
Israel can also help mediate the end of this conflict as they have pretty good relations with both Ukraine and Russia, and odds of that are higher if they don't give or sell weapons directly to Ukraine.
> As a strictly emotional thought, this makes me feel Israel is a country to cozy up to the strongest nation at the time. If the US falls from grace Israel will have no problem ‘switching’ sides to Russia.
What you are describing in geopolitics. Israel is not special in this regard.
One major factor of alliances is realpolitik and benefits to ones' country. The US has close relations to Israel for many reasons, and the relationship didn't benefit the US in some or many ways, do you really think the US would be a close ally of Israel?
For any smaller country (in terms of population, economics, etc) like Israel, being aware of the massive countries (like the US, China, EU, to a lesser extent Japan and India) are sensible considerations. The US would do the same thing in Israel or any similar sized country's position, would it not?
1. "And for what - symbolic gain alone?"
You advocate giving (or selling) weapons. That isn't symbolic alone, so I'd remove this if I could. It's really more common to see the view that Israel isn't taking a clear enough stance again Russia with symbolic things. It seems pretty clear (see the UN vote).
Nonetheless, Israel giving or selling weapons would complicate an already tricky relationship with Russia. Russia may act as if it is an act of war (arguably it would be reasonable for Russia to do so).
2. India is another country to consider. While not as close an ally to the US compared to Israel, they are either an ally or friendly (depending on the arena / what you mean by ally). India abstained from voting in the UN vote criticizing Russia's invasion of Ukraine. In US media and social media, they got relatively little criticism and attention for this compared to comments I've seen directed at Israel. Even though Israel did in fact vote to criticize Russia. Some people in this thread were at best unaware or at worst lied about this basic, verifiable fact. Apparently Israel even lobbied some other countries to vote the same way they did.
India's reasons for abstaining are also realpolitik and largely driven from considerations around military cooperation with Russia. I don't know too much about Indian / Russian military cooperation, but from what I've read it is much closer and deeper than Israel and Russia. Israel and Russia I'd describe as having few overlaps and at a distance. I'd characterize it as Russia begrudgingly accepting Israel's occasional attacks on Syrian targets and / or Iranian targets in Syria that are trying to supply better weapons to Hezbollah, Hamas, or other people closer to Israel. Given that Syria is a close ally of Russia, it's mildly awkward for Russia, but Syria depends on Russia more than the other way around, Russia is more powerful, Israel is useful for Russia for economic reasons, and Russia can understand Israel's military considerations.
Did you forget the part where all Israel's neighbours attempted to invade it and ended up losing territory?
Ukraine never attacked Russia on the other hand...
Because it's supported by the wealthiest country with the biggest army.
Geopolitically, Israel made the diplomatic masterstroke of allying itself heavily with America, which makes it rather difficult to actually punish them through the official channels for such things. Even things like symbolic non-binding UN condemnations of the most heinous things Israel has done would get regularly vetoed by the US up until recently.
Furthermore, there's a question that most anti-Zionism doesn't have a good answer to: how do we keep another Holocaust from happening? Winding down the underlying Israel-Palestine conflict in a one-state solution means significantly diluting the Jewish majority in Israel with people who are, justifiably, very angry about the shit Israel did. Actually, they're unjustifiably angry, too; and one of the prevailing political parties in Palestine has made "commit another Holocaust" one of their explicit goals[1].
Conditioning any peace solution on special protected status for Jews might fix this, but the only difference between that and "special protected status for whites in South Africa" is an increasingly flimsy social context that's doing an awful lot of work. It would be difficult to balance the need to prevent another Holocaust against the needs of Palestinians, and the sort of right-wingers that like the idea of race wars would absolutely insist on their needs overriding the "other side's"[2].
Nothing I said above should be taken as justifying Israel's nonsense, or the nonsense of Hamas, of course. But Zionism relies upon all other alternatives either being unworkable, or worse. Israel is very much akin to an apartheid state, but all the countries that can really put pressure on Israel to stop that have no moral authority to do so. The UK and France are responsible for partitioning Palestine in the first place; Germany killed six million Jews; and America refused to admit refugees from that genocide. Zionism is banking on history repeating[3]; or at least people believing that it will repeat should Israel step back from the brink of ethnostate nationalism.
[0] For the purpose of this comment I will restrict "Zionism" to just the demand for a non-secular Jewish state in the land currently occupied by Israel and/or Palestine; i.e. Zionism in it's current form.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamas_Covenant
Granted, this is #NotAllOfHamas, but party hardliners still insist it's their manifesto.
[2] Insamuch as you can even neatly divide the people in question into two "sides". In fact, Israel and Palestine do not divide neatly into Jewish and Muslim; there are plenty of Israeli Arabs and Palestinian Jews out there.
[3] When they aren't insisting that this is an "ancient conflict" to make their side seem more legitimate.
Did the U.S. prevent Iraqis from marrying Americans in 2003? What about Afghans in 2001?
Israel has said Palestine is not a nation, and has worked to block Palestine from entering the UN as a member state.
England and the US definitely allowed Germans to move to the country before, during, and after the conflict - and plenty of them. You'd be grilled by authorities for sure, and probably observed for months afterwards, but that's it. And here you're equating members of a political party with people born in a certain country, which is not really fair.
> Should the Ukraine allow a million Russians to marry on Zoom and come live in Kiev?
Why not? They would see first-hand the result of misguided policies and likely support Ukrainian instances. Unless, of course, you think there is such thing as a "Ukrainian race" worth preserving...
Possibly illegal
48 of 130,000 amounts to 0.037% being involved in terrorist activities which seems very low to be used as justification for a law around security.
48 terrorists means somewhere between hundreds and thousands of innocent people died.
Assuming the ratios of terrorists to innocent spouses stays constant, 2708 innocent spouses will be denied citizenship for every terrorist mildly inconvenienced.
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30639558
I'm an Israeli, politically left leaning and it's a shame that I need to write the following(and for many years I've believed the opposite) :
The Israeli Arabs are a big problem. We've seen it during the last war with Gaza, when those many Israeli Arab citizens created mobs that did many violent actions in quite a few places. Israeli people in some cities had to flee their homes. And yes there we're also Israeli mobs.
This is not the first time this happens.
It's gotten seriously bad, so bad that now the Israeli Army is building special roads bypassing areas with a lot of Israeli Arab citizens, because those areas aren't safe to use in the case of a war on our borders,
So objectively, Arabs and Jews mix very poorly.
So is it wise to add another 130K such citizens every ten years ? Or more specifically, Palestinians, who hate us even more ? Or is it just increasing the problem ?
And sure, this isn't a nice decision. We Israelis live in a partial war situation. That's the reality.
So you can't compare it to barring Mexicans from enter to the US. It's much more complicated.
Consider if the US passed a law banning Mexican spouses from uniting with their US spouse to keep America’s “Christian character”.
That's not a very good analogy, because Mexico is probably more Christian than the US.
No, it doesn't. Also, aren't most Mexicans technically white (i.e. that's what they're supposed to check on a US census form)? It's just a bad analogy.
There are paths to modify that analogy to make it work (or at least work better) for the pair America and Mexico, but you're not following any of those.
Your second paragraph is one of the worst analogies I've seen in a while. You have to find a bordering country with a different religion with whom USA has been at war for decades.
It was repealed in 1985
1)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prohibition_of_Mixed_Marriages...
What the fuck?
Don't agree with the headline or the law.
They aren't banning spouses, they are banning naturalization of them.
I don't know what other visas are applicable for Israel, in Japan if you get married you can get a spouse visa(1,3,5 year) but you won't be able to get a permanent residency right away.
1) Journalists at Reuters suck, 2) It's standard clickbait to drive traffic in, or 3) Journalists at Reuters purposedly oriented their article.
Whatever the explanation is for this debacle of an article, I don't like it.
https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/israeli-right-wing-party...
it allows Israel's favored demographic to maintain a majority.
It's in the article.
> Proponents say the law helps ensure Israel's security and maintains its "Jewish character".
> "The State of Israel is Jewish and so it will remain," said Simcha Rothman of the far-right Religious Zionism party, a member of the opposition who brought the law forward with Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked.
Rationale 1: Terrorists are constantly looking for ways to get in a country, if the marriage background checks are proven not to be secure then it makes sense to pause it until a solution is found indeed.
Rationale 2: Jewish hate Arabs is the explanation for everything.
And I'm saying it would have been great if the article provided enough information so that we could make our own opinion based on more facts.
[1] https://www.timesofisrael.com/months-after-citizenship-law-f...
In fact Nigeria recognizes the right of Nigerians to bring their spouse to live with them in Nigeria and even offers Nigerian citizenship. Nigeria is actually more advanced than many western countries in this respect.
“another real problem remains unresolved in Israel: The visceral hatred and contempt that many “Ashkenazi” or European-origin Israelis have for “Mizrahi” Jews, and the way that the media exacerbates racial stereotypes by repeating them without self-critique.”
1. https://www.algemeiner.com/2015/04/15/israel-must-banish-its...
This entire concept has a dedicated article on Wikipedia [0]. It's a pretty fun read for those that believe Arab(or those of other non-Jewish ehtnicities, though they are far fewer) citizens of Israel are fundamentally equal to Jewish citizens of Israel.
Basically, Israel is all for equality, but with some limits - essentially, it would not be acceptable for people who are not Jewish to have an outsize power in Israel, though they are free to participate as minority parties. This is, in my opinion, the main reason why Israel has never attempted to annex the Palestinian territories. The Arab majority (or near majority today) that would form in the population would seriously challenge the idea of a Jewish and democratic state - they would be forced to stop recognizing Arabs' right to vote and/or hold office.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_and_democratic_state
Ethnoreligious...to be precise.
https://churchlifejournal.nd.edu/articles/zizek-has-a-lot-to...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2UOM3C3q7II
Zizek is certainly a madman, being both an atheist christian and a marxist in our day and age
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnoreligious_group
With your logic it would be like: Japan is for Shintos, Italy for Roman Catholics, Israel for Jews....sounds terrible no?
Since like forever Jews where all over the world (and called it their home) with vastly different cultures/food/music, there is not the ONE Jewish Culture but thousands, you just cant compare it to Japan or Italy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aliyah#Zionist_Aliyah_(1882_on...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aliyah#From_Iran
You cannot become a Japanese if you practice their religion for seven years, but you can become Jewish.
I know "Italians are racists lol" trends in football subreddits, but that has nothing to do with the law of the land.
1. Israel wasn't formed organically, they first had to get rid of the hundreds of thousands of pesky Palestinians living in Palestine for a few hundred years. The Japanese didn't take over a, say, Chinese island and settle there (though they tried in Manchuria during WWII).
2. None of the other states you mention has anything resembling the ethno-state character of Israel. There is nothing in the Italian constitution that is even slightly aimed at making sure a non-Italian can't become president (even if not explicitly prohibiting it)[0]. Italy doesn't recognize the right of ethnic Italians to automatically become citizens by moving to Italy.
[0] though it's rare, there are well known cases of nation states having presidents of minority ethnicity. For example, right now in the middle of war, the president of Ukraine is himself Jewish. Also right now, Klaus Iohannis, of German ethnicity, is president of Romania. Peru has had an ethnically Japanese president (Alberto Fujimori) and more recently the son of an Austrian immigrant.
> The Naturalization Act of 1790 (1 Stat. 103, enacted March 26, 1790) was a law of the United States Congress that set the first uniform rules for the granting of United States citizenship by naturalization. The law limited naturalization to "free White person(s) ... of good character", thus excluding Native Americans, indentured servants, slaves, free black people and later Asians, although free black people were allowed citizenship at the state level in a number of states.
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naturalization_Act_of_1790
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_nationalism#United_State...
For what it's worth Israel could go the federation route - basically, have three largely autonomous federal states, one for Jewish Israel, one for the West Bank and one for Gaza, with the federal government only taking care of finances, energy, water and security, and the rest - including passports and diplomatic relations - be done by the individual states.
Also, a federal government that is not in charge of diplomatic relationships is no government at all.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_Laws#Law_for_the_Pro...
> What the fuck?
Israel was founded as a state for the Jewish people, so they could have some political self-determination, which given their history, doesn't seem like a such bad thing. It would entirely subvert that if it became a state controlled by other kinds of people, like all other states in the world.
Let's say Muslim Arabs become the majority in Israel, wouldn't it then become the kind of place that the ancestors of the Jewish Israelis fled from (for good reason)? There are also literally dozens of other Muslim Arab states, so the transmogrification of Israel into another would be a net-negative for diversity.
IMHO the comparisons of Israel to apartheid break down because the motivations are different. IIRC, the South African whites wanted to maintain dominance over a big subject population, the Jewish Israelis just want a state for themselves.
The Jews didn't exactly jump from Judea as opposed to getting pushed:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bar_Kokhba_revolt
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish–Roman_wars
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syria_Palaestina
Certainly there was a diaspora before that, but the (Second) Temple was still a large focus, but that ended as well:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Jerusalem_(70_CE)
Certainly there were always Jews (and Christians, and later Muslims) in that geographic area, but to say that Jews particularly 'deserve' exclusive governing of that area may be stretching it given the two thousand years of history since they last had 'exclusivity' to it.
> IMHO the comparisons of Israel to apartheid break down because the motivations are different. IIRC, the South African whites wanted to maintain dominance over a big subject population, the Jewish Israelis just want a state for themselves.
A reasonable desire. The Poles also wanted a state for themselves for a while, and finally got one (after a messy twentieth century), but would it be okay for them to say "no blacks or Arabs" in their naturalization/citizenship laws? (Versus the perhaps 'simpler' idea of "must be fluent in Polish and be familiar with Polish culture/history".)
Palestinians also want a state of their own, but Israel is (according to some) squatting on their land:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_settlement
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_of_Palestine
Don't both have a right (?) to exist? Why does Israel deny to others what it wants for itself?
> The Jews didn't exactly jump from Judea as opposed to getting pushed:
That's not what I had in mind. I was thinking of more recent history, like this: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/03/opinion/last-jew-afghanis...
> Dozens of countries around the world have had their Last Jews. The Libyan city of Tripoli was, astonishingly, one-quarter Jewish in 1941; today the entire country is Jew-free. After the fall of Muammar el-Qaddafi, who banished the country’s lingering Jews during his reign, a lone Libyan Jew came back to Tripoli and took down a concrete wall sealing the city’s one remaining synagogue. But he was soon forced to flee, having been warned that an antisemitic mob was coming for his head.
----
> Certainly there were always Jews (and Christians, and later Muslims) in that geographic area, but to say that Jews particularly 'deserve' exclusive governing of that area may be stretching it given the two thousand years of history since they last had 'exclusivity' to it.
I don't think it's a stretch. There's more to it than just historical tenancy.
> Palestinians also want a state of their own, but Israel is (according to some) squatting on their land:
Sure, but it would be yet another Middle Eastern Arab Muslim state. Why erase something unique for that?
> Palestinians also want a state of their own, but Israel is (according to some) squatting on their land:
> Don't both have a right (?) to exist? Why does Israel deny to others what it wants for itself?
Unfortunately, the world doesn't divide into nice neat categories that don't conflict.
>What the fuck?
Why all the outrage? Should France not maintain it's French character?
The only other countries on Earth today that have anything similar to this type of language and laws are Hungary and, to a lesser extent, Russia (which both offer passports to foreign nationals of hungarian/russian ethnicity, for example).
Wow
This law, by the way, is unconstitutional* for more reasons than just the race-based discrimination. It defines different criteria for "permitted spouse" by gender, and has exceptions for specific religions (e.g. Druze).
*Israel doesn't really have a constitution, but there are certain "core laws" that the Supreme Court decided in the '90s that it can use as a basis to strike down other laws passed by the Parliament.
This is the same exact tactic used by the Anti-BDS proponents in the US. On the face of it the anti-BDS laws enacted in 35 states are blatantly unconstitutional.
There are two issues that have allowed them to stick around. First is the fact that it is much easier to pass a new law (however unconstitutional) than to repeal it and secondly as you alluded to, the tricks that are employed after the law is struck down is to tweak and alter the law to keep it on the books for a bit longer until the second version gets challenged.
For example in Abby Martin v. the State of Georgia the original law stated that for any contract up to 1,000$ there is an exemption to the law. While she won the ruling, the end result became that the law was amended to raise the certification exemption from $1,000 to $100,000. I am not sure if they are appealing the original ruling.
(not saying that's what you're advocating, just that that is one approach in use today, and given Israel's transgressions against the Palestinians I wouldn't be surprised if they were capable of that).
The amount of hate against Jews in this post is proof enough.
Regarding the Israel lobby, it is strong, but it's losing its grip:
25% of American Jews consider Israel to be an apartheid state [2]
Young evangelicals are increasingly turning away from Israel [3]
[1] https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/.premium-u-s-senate-approves...
[2] https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/a-quarter-of-u-s-jews-agree-...
[3] https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2021/05/26/a...
Ben and Jerry's ice cream (founded by Jewish Americans) decided not to sell ice cream in some disputed territories between Israel and Palestine and the lobby swiftly pushed Illinois and NY pension funds to sell all their holdings in their stock. Basically screwing with other people money for their power play.
Abhorrent but not about preventing marriages, at least not directly
They will also claim it is about preventing terrorism, but that is an extremely transparent fig leaf.
"Can Non-Jewish People Settle In Israel?
Under the Law of Return, it is possible for non-Israeli family members of Israeli citizens to gain long-term residence status in Israel, including spouses/partners, children, and grandchildren, if they themselves are not Jewish.
Where a non-Israeli national is married to an Israeli citizen, they can initially acquire a temporary residence in Israel after six months. With this temporary status, they can then access the social welfare system in Israel, including healthcare. Citizenship is then possible after four years, however, the process for securing this is quite rigorous, as the Israeli immigration authorities want to be assured that the relationship is genuine.
Where a non-Israeli national is in a relationship with an Israeli citizen but they are not married (i.e. a civil partnership), it takes three years to gain temporary resident status in Israel. Permanent residence in Israel is possible after six years (as opposed to four for those who are married). However, those in a civil partnership cannot acquire citizenship, just permanent residency, regardless of how long the non-Israeli national lives in the country." https://immigrationlawyers-london.com/global-mobility/perman...
Oppressed people are not better because they are oppressed. They are still human and perfectly able to persecute others depending on the context.
300 years ago the Ottoman Empire was in full swing and quite religiously and ethnically diverse (probably more so than modern Europe or America). Not to say everyone had equal rights or was nice to each other, but historically a cornerstone for the success of many (not all) empires has been a significant degree of diversity and tolerance of both religions and ethnicity. It also wasn't new, Rome was also quite diverse and tolerant. (not always, not to everyone, but still quite so)
Ancient empires were even more diverse, with civil wars often arising more along economic lines than ethnic or religious ones.
In other words, religious tolerance with polytheistic societies looks a lot different than the "my god/prophet vs. yours" which is much more prominent with monotheistic religions.
An Arab from Morocco would "import" to France - Morocco is an independent country. Israel does not recognize Palestine as an independent country but as territory belonging to Israel, and the IDF patrol the West Bank and haredi settlers create settlements there, in violation of UN resolutions.
They are not European Holocaust survivors or their direct descendants.
It looks to me like the powerful oppress the powerless, but power fluctuates among groups/nations.
anti-Semitic /ˌantɪsɪˈmɪtɪk/ (adj): Hostile to or prejudiced against Jewish people.
Magneto is a super relatable and his actions in the context of the mutant human conflict make total sense given his motivations -- he's also still a villain.
Relevant part: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Eichmann#Capture
There isn’t even recognition that the Israeli legislature might not be representative of most Jewish Israelis and instead be a consequence of political incumbents that are hard to unseat from power, like political dynasties in many countries.
Nor does it accept that even if this is the majority will of Jewish Israelis, there are plenty of Jews in Israel who disagree with the law (which is obviously true), and shouldn’t be lumped in as “oppressors”. The same way Trump and his followers actions shouldn’t impugn the moral character of all Americans.
No, this is a wholesale indiscriminate attack on Jewish people, global or Israeli. Purposefully vague and universal in it’s attack of an entire ethnic minority group There is no chance this comment isn’t xenophobic to it’s core.
To change the regime, do it by suffering the people?
In my opinion what is interesting is that the oppressed people have preserved democracy in the face of constant war and even provided full right to the partly that 5 times attacked them, current coalition consists of Arab parties.
This law tries to prevent Muslims and Christians living in non-annexed occupied territories from marrying other Muslims and Christians living outside of Israel's effective control area.
I support the right for Israel to exist and if they must expel the inhabitants of the land they have taken. But the mistreatment of palestinians is not acceptable by theirs or any other abrahamic faith.
Where's the outcry.
I hate 21st century
e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Jews_in_Syria#21st_...
Is this meant to be some theoretical gotcha? Firstly, anyone who believes in what you’ve quoted is soundly dismissed as a paranoid conspiracy theorist - a racist one at that.
Secondly, this strikes me as “you guys would pass the same law if you could get away with it”. But the main reason why this kind of law would never get passed in Europe is because it’s wrong and goes against human rights and the virtue of not discriminating based on race.
Did they somehow reach out to the thousands of couples and ask them "hey did you take part in this subplot?"
Delusional shit.
People are opposed to it because it 1) codifies that an Israeli citizen’s race is an acceptable criterion for determining which rights they are entitled to, and 2) the law is a reactionary measure expressly designed to discriminate and maintain racial/ethnic composition. The people who voted for it aren’t even trying to hide it or dog-whistle it away: “"The State of Israel is Jewish and so it will remain," said Simcha Rothman of the far-right Religious Zionism party””
Any such law, anywhere, would be soundly denounced and repealed. Especially in Europe, which you had mentioned in your hypothetical question.
I, too, get concerned of the explosion of disgusting brown people that threatens my beautiful non Arabic speaking country.
/s if not clear.
Genuine question, do you truly feel the commenter is a racist, and you just stepped in and called them out successfully?
What seems much more likely is that they, in their sarcasm, were doing an imitation of an ignorant conservative stereotype by focusing on skin color and grouping all middle easterners into a group. This seems fairly obvious to me - is that not how you're interpreting this?
Not GP, but I do consider this to be low-key racist and aaomidi to be somewhat racist, but maybe for different reason than GP.
I would also be fine with publicly shaming view points like yours and getting you fired from your job for being completely xenophobic. I can't imagine how you view your middle eastern coworkers who you've decided hate women and shit?
>fired from your job for being completely xenophobic.
Disapproving of very real cultural differences is not "xenophobia". Forcing women to cover themselves, limiting their independence, practicing arranged marriages and condoning physical abuse, my opposition to these practices stems from my western liberal ideals, not any sort of "phobia".
>I can't imagine how you view your middle eastern coworkers who you've decided hate women and shit?
That's because you are apparently unable to discern individuals from groups. A sane person can acknowledge that cultures have sets of typical practices/beliefs, but individuals may or may not share them.
However, isn't what you're describing colonization? If the US or the UK announced a program of attempting to colonize 3rd-world countries, those countries would reflexively ban US immigration. Why the double standard?
Secondly, in fact this is an Arabic speaking country. I personally speak Arabic, I learn from my Arab friends and neighbours. So everything that I'm mentioning is from the actual experience of living here and understanding both Western culture and the Arab culture (for the most part).
Thirdly, these people are going to have a dozen babies per wife no matter where the wives come from. And with the modern healthcare that everybody receives, all those babies will grow to be adults - something that was not the case when their culture developed the need to have a dozen babies per wife.
I don't blame you for not understanding, the media reports on the situation with no lies but eliminating perspective. If we had the same race issues as the US, and if "marriage" meant the same here as US audiences expect, then your rage would be justified. The task of mentioning these differences would fall on the body "reporting" the situation if the reporting goal were to spread information. But the spread of information is not the goal of the reporting - as evidenced by what information they include and what information they eliminate.
According to the article, the law prevents first and only Palestinian spouses of Israeli citizens from becoming Israeli citizens, when love is the sole reason for wanting to marry. If Israel wanted to prevent citizens from having "third of fourth wives", an acceptable way would be to outlaw polygamy; if it wanted to prevent bogus marriages, an acceptable way would be by not granting marriage certificates when the couple don't know each other.
Just look at the list of US allies and the kind of laws they pass, think of Arabia Saudi, a good US ally that had been tormenting Yemen for years now. Is the US population clamoring to stop collaboration with this country? Of course not, most people wouldn't know the first thing about this.
I think sometimes we overestimate how much governments are willing to do just because people are not fine with it, assuming they actually have any understanding of what's going on.
And if you meant moral support by the citizens of other countries I'm not sure how much Israel cares about that.
They care a lot. That's why they try so hard to counter pro-Palestinian sentiment with full-time paid propagandists, threat campaigns, media campaigns, smear campaigns, political bribes, getting people fired, attacking students and groups that support Palestine, throwing shit-fits at growing BDS campaigns, etc, etc, etc...
Yes, the US population is similarly quiet on the SA front - that's neither accidental or natural. Even then, it's crumbling.
> Hasn't quantifiable monetary support towards Israel been growing for decades?
Globally speaking, the US govt haven't really been on the side of the 'good guys' for decades. Realizing that, it doesn't make all that much sense to use their funding of evil regimes as any sort of justification, or reflection of the will of the general populace.
[0] https://news.gallup.com/poll/340331/americans-favor-israel-w...
[1] https://theintercept.com/2018/12/17/israel-texas-anti-bds-la...
"Young evangelicals are increasingly turning away from Israel" [1]
[0] https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/a-quarter-of-u-s-jews-agree-...
[1] https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2021/05/26/a...
Jews and Evangelicals generally support Israel, albeit for different reasons. Some are, as you note, increasingly unsure of that support, especially as it extends the rule of a government that is widely seen (not just by Israel's enemies) as cruel. But older Evangelicals have a nearly fanatical support of Israel -- including those same policies.
And in general, Americans see Israel as an ally in a turbulent Middle East. Their support for it will depend largely on their perception of Middle Eastern politics and our need for their support.
Jews are a small minority in the US. Evangelicals are a large minority. So you can get countervailing trends that end up making both what you said and what the GP said true.
This is really about the (internationally recognized) right of return of the Palestinians. To paraphrase Bill Clinton's advisor James Carville in 1992: "It's demographics, stupid".
The 2003 law explicitly did not apply to residents of Jewish settlements in the West Bank wanting to marry and live with their spouse inside Israel, making it, and the ongoing policy underpinning it, blatantly discriminatory.
The thing to realize about this new law is that while it makes no mention of religion, it doesn't need to in order to add to the fragmentation of the indigenous people of the area. Non-Jews in the West Bank cannot now gain citizenship in Israel, if that was an avenue they had before, nor can they return to their villages (granted, almost all these villages within Israel have been destroyed so there's nothing to return to) or gain compensation for their loss.
(For a film adaptation of the 1949 novel by S. Yizhar called Khirbet Khizeh, search for the youtube version produced by Israeli Television in 1970 (and immediately banned in 1978 when it was released.))
I'm not sure why this outrages people in the US. Since 2002, Israel has adopted a policy of prohibiting Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza from gaining status in Israel or East Jerusalem through marriage, thus preventing family unification.
The Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law enshrined the policy in law between 2003 and its expiry in July 2021. The law barred thousands of Palestinians in Israel and East Jerusalem from living there with their Palestinian spouses from the West Bank and Gaza. Israel’s then interior minister stated the law was needed because “it was felt that [family unification] would be exploited to achieve a creeping right of return...”
This recent law just formalized and made permanent what was always there: the demographics is what's important here. When you look at Zionism as a colonial settler project, it's just part of "purity" laws and an essential part of apartheid.
It's Israel, who's surprised.
> Israel is slowly losing its support in the free democratic world where people believe in the inalienable universal rights of individuals and are less and less willing to turn a blind eye to such institutionalized racism.
If using tanks against children throwing rocks or white phosphorus bombs over civilians didn't do it I doubt anything will. I'd recommend you to get in touch with a Palestinian and ask them about their life. Israel has been committing war crimes every now and then for decades, they're smarter than the Russians though, they do it bit by bit.
Talking about discrimination, don't read about their border control interrogations, if you have an arab sounding name, talked to a person with an arab sounding name or visited cities with a large arab population during your stay be ready to spend 4 hours in a small room with a few unpleasant people asking you about every single minutes of your trip.
It's one of the most discriminatory non third world country, if not the most. You literally have citizen of the same country treated differently depending on their last name and/or their religion, and worst than that, they don't even have the same rights.
It's not some "soft" racism like in the US where, in theory, everyone is equal in term of rights and in front of the justice, in Israel you have laws that only applies to non jewish people, they're not even trying to pretend, it's institutionalized and a source of pride
Israel/Palestine is similar to what's going on in Ukraine right now in many aspects but everyone seems to ignore that. It's just further away, happening slower and is committed by an historic ally.
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/north-africa-west-asia/isra...
https://www.vox.com/world/2018/7/31/17623978/israel-jewish-n...
https://imeu.org/article/fact-sheet-palestinian-citizens-of-...
Even now with white blue-eyed christian Ukrainians flooding Israel, they are being left in the airport for days, and interrogated to see who had a Jewish great grandfather and who did not. If you did - thats a free ticket in. If not? Wait a few more days, we might take you in if you put up collateral cash (around $3,000 per refugee). No money? you're put on a plane back to Poland. Only because your great grandfather was not Jewish
Its easy to twist this state of mind as racist towards 1 population. But there are rules that are just as hard on any non-jew. If you've ever met a Jewish Israeli who married a non-jew, they will tell you how complicated even visiting their parents on vacation with kids has become
This is apartheid.
[0] https://www.timesofisrael.com/months-after-citizenship-law-f...
These days I live in the Southeastern US. Since 2020 was a census year, states have been redrawing their electoral maps. Several states have made changes that reduce the voting power of non-white voters. If politicians say this had nothing to do with race does that make it true? Even if it is true that they didn't consider race at all in the decision making process, does that make it acceptable when the end result impacts people in a noticeable way based on their race?
Just to give a short (but relatively surface-level) proof that this distinction is real and meaningful in Israeli politics, you can read the most recent former PM's statements in the following link (and I would encourage reading a broad political spectrum of commentary on the various citizenship and nationality laws, in particular those passed in the last few decades, e.g., Nation-State Law): https://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Benjamin-Netanyahu/Netanya...
You might argue that technically this is targeting non-citzens and is therefore not affecting Israeli citizens of any nationality. But to me this is clearly targeted at limiting the normal actions of one group of citizens, while there are other laws to expand and accelerate analogous actions by another group of citizens. There are tens of thousands of Arab Israelis who have been married to non-Israeli Palestinians since 2003 when this law first went into place (the new law is just a law that regularizes a "temporary" "security" law that was renewed yearly until it surprisingly did not get support for yearly renewal in 2021). Those tens of thousands of families are in a very precarious situation, with a spouse with very limited rights to movement, and no rights at all if their Israeli citizen spouse were to die, etc. -- they would be deported (and I believe many have been).
Edit: Israel's interior minister has referred to the law's purpose in a way that shows the purpose is also to discriminate against the Arab Israelis and their ability to get married and have a normal family life: "we don’t need to mince words, the law also has demographic reasons": https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/shaked-family-unificatio...
As for more specific and direct examples, it is legal for the Jewish National Fund to refuse to sell or lease land to non-Jewish national Israelis (i.e., mostly Arab Israelis). The JNF is not public, but it owns a substantial percentage of Israeli land, about 13%, and I don't have information to hand, but I believe there are other bodies with similar practices that administer the majority of Israeli land in this way -- that's a hazy memory though, and I don't have time to research it again, so I wouldn't rely on it.
The Admissions Committees Law also allows for town committees to deny the right of Israelis to buy/lease land/property if they are deemed "unsuitable to the social life of the community [...] or the social and cultural fabric of the town", and allows for the cultural fabric of the town to be based on "special characteristics", such as defining themselves as having a "Zionist vision". This further means non-Zionist citizens are barred -- of course, many Jews in the world are non-Zionist or even anti-Zionist, but I don't think it's jumping to conclusions to infer based on the cultural backdrop that this is primarily a means to exclude non-Jewish nationals.
I think those two are specific examples of "legal" discrimination directly on the basis of non-Jewish nationality.
I tried to make my statements and figures based on objectively verifiable information (the stated policy of JNF and its land holdings, naming the Admissions Committees Law). I think if you were to account for the broader discrimination in property sale/leasing, the amount of land where non-Jewish nationals are denied would be much higher than 13%, never mind counting the colonies in the occupied territories.
I'm also skeptical because official discrimination (until the new laws passed in the past 20 years or so) was de facto widespread, but previously was de jure illegal (case in point: https://archive.ph/20120911010849/http://www.nytimes.com/200...).
I would agree with you if you were saying that petty discrimination (done by individual land-owners) is widespread against all "nationalities", but the issue is that entire neighborhoods, communities, and territories have official sanction and support to be discriminatory against non-Jewish nationalities. And if you believe as I do that Israel must retreat to its border as defined by international law, and that it has in fact done the opposite and engaged in literal colonization for 60 years or so, then it would be plain to see why much of this conversation is besides the point. Of course there will be petty discrimination, perhaps even rooted in each side's belief that each property transaction is really a territorial battle. The actions of consequence are those of the state and those backed by the state apparatus.
>Currently, in Israel “proper” (within the Green Line), only 7 percent of the land is owned privately by individuals (3 percent Jews and 4 percent Arabs). According to the Israeli NGO Regavim, the rest is owned by the Jewish state (80 percent) and the Jewish National Fund (13 percent)
https://jewishjournal.com/commentary/opinion/marty_kaplan/12...
> [Arab Israeli citizens owning private land] apply similar restriction on any Jewish family trying to settle in a predominantly Arab town or village. A similar restriction doesn't apply to predominantly Jewish towns, only to small community villages.
I'm not sure, because you clearly make a distinction between towns and small community villages, so I could be wrong, but it sounds like even there you are describing the (probably rampant) petty discrimination by individuals on 4% of the land. My default is also to assume there are comparable levels of petty discrimination on the other 3% of private land, unless you have some reference to support your comments about restrictions only applying in the other direction.
To repeat another point though, I am highlighting the rigidly enforced discrimination on at least 13% of the land, and think this is far more significant than haphazard petty discrimination on either side of the 4% and 3% private land divide, where creating or buttressing homogenous communities is far harder without state support (though one side does have that). Never mind that, like I said I don't have time to research it now, but I think a substantial portion of that 80% of state land has similar restrictions in place against non-Jewish nationals.
As I said:
> Of course there will be petty discrimination, perhaps even rooted in each side's belief that each property transaction is really a territorial battle. The actions of consequence are those of the state and those backed by the state apparatus.
To make clear the reasons for this:
- they cover a far greater proportion of the land
- they are far more rigidly enforced
- their power to engineer demography is far greater, as the instruments at their disposal are far more powerful (punitive travel/work restrictions, evictions, municipal infrastructure support/denial, military support/harassment, etc.)
However, if a Jewish family tries to move into a predominantly Arab town, it will be pushed out even if legally there is no exclusion. Yes, by illegal means if necessary. The petty discrimination levels are different in those two cases.
Regardless of the above, the majority of Israeli population (92%) lives in large cities, where every citizen can buy an apartment, and in most cases the construction companies are not allowed to discriminate at all.
http://web.archive.org/web/20210214010143/https://www.haaret...
The point I was indirectly making, was that there was vocal support from other Jewish Israelis in the area. It's highly probable that among those protesters, there are many such people where if they were selling their property, they would not obligingly sell to the best offer if it came from an Arab Israeli. My personal opinion is that there would be many who would not make the sale (there are also many many Jewish Israelis who would, of course). This one concrete case becomes in all likelihood many examples of the exact thing we're talking about.
I do agree that there are some judicial checks in place against some such cases.
Otherwise, you seem to be talking about special legal carve-outs related to contested territories for restrictions on movement. The claim that non-Jewish Israel citizens are not allowed to live their partner is utter nonsense, unless by “live with” you mean “confer residency rights” but that seems like a dishonest framing.
Edit (responding to your edit): While that’s a shitty message and you can take issue with that (and related cultural issues in Israel), Netanyahu also notes that “Arab citizens have equal rights”. You’re actually asserting that this isn’t the case and need to explain how.
As for my framing and the question of "live" vs. "confer residency rights", I tried to be clear and say that my argument was about what restrictions are in place "in practice" and in the aggregate. If it is difficult for normal family formation and existence, and if that difficulty is for "demographic reasons", then that is discrimination on the Arab Israelis as well as their non-citizen spouses: https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/shaked-family-unificatio...
This phrase is rarely appropriate when discussing marriage in Israel, never mind marriage with Palestinians.
It’s been this way for a while. This is just one more thing on top of another.
Or is support of cultural preservation only virtuous when the alternative is labeled "gentrification"?
Well yeah. "Cultural preservation" is only good when the NGO class supports it. When they don't like it, it's racism.
As a biracial Jew from Pakistan I can assure you this is false. The modern enmity between Jews and Muslims began around the time of Israel's creation [1].
As far as 'preserving culture', this sounds a little to close to the Fourteen Words for my comfort. You can celebrate and keep alive one's own culture without the exclusion and denial of rights to others. I think the idea of ethnostates run counter to the core values of most modern, liberal democracies.
[1] https://dailytimes.com.pk/97778/the-jews-of-pakistan/
But not to the core values of middle eastern Arab countries, which is the point to limiting the possibility of a sizeable proportion of immigrants imposing their incompatible culture onto host nations.
>As far as 'preserving culture', this sounds a little to close to the Fourteen Words for my comfort.
There is no reason to presume that the values of your "modern, liberal democracies" will be maintained if there is no effort to preserve them. The rest of the world is far less concerned with your ideas regarding women's or LGBT rights. Allusions to the fourteen words are effectively a false equivalence, there is a massive range between maintaining a liberal way of life and going on a multinational genocidal war campaign.
>As a biracial Jew from Pakistan I can assure you this is false. The modern enmity between Jews and Muslims began around the time of Israel's creation [1].
The enmity is baked into the Koran and therefore approximately as old as Islam.
Source, dearly lacking. Though I'm uncertain how you would support this claim. I tried digging up some examples, but the best I found was a list of countries [0] supporting 'right to return' laws with accelerated naturalization if you are of the 'favored' ethnicity. I don't see any arab or middle eastern countries on this list. I sincerely would appreciate any supporting articles you have towards this claim.
I agree liberal values must be defended. I just don't believe illiberal methods such as those described in the OP are effective methods of doing so. I think the world is growing more concerned with things like LGBT and women's rights in large part because of the freedom of exchange of information, ideas, and experiences. These are accelerated by both the internet and multicultural cities and nations which aren't possible with ethnicity-based immigration laws.
You're right I should not have alluded to the Fourteen Words, I could have picked a better example. The similarities in attitude frighten me, however. Elevating the safety and prosperity of ethnic group A to the detriment of group B is not promoting or maintaining a liberal way of life, despite what we might want to call it.
> The enmity is baked into the Koran and therefore approximately as old as Islam.
I won't rehash my previous response to this idea, but leave a hopefully unbiased wiki link [1] on the subject with just one small anecdote. The holiday of purim is an entire commemoration of the 'elimination' of a certain peoples. Does this mean a certain enmity is baked into the Torah towards Amalekites? Do you think this history actually gives you a negative bias towards the present day descendants of Hamman?
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_of_return#Countries_with...
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism_in_Islam#The_Qura...
> Antisemitism has increased in the Muslim world during modern times. While Bernard Lewis and Uri Avnery date the increase in antisemitism to the establishment of Israel, M. Klein suggests that antisemitism could have been present in the mid-19th century.
> Scholars point to European influences, including those of the Nazis (see below), and the establishment of Israel as the root causes of antisemitism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism_in_Islam#The_Qura...
Somewhat ironically, that Wikipedia article is cherry picking. It gives lots of examples that support its thesis and fails to mention or downplays counter examples, of which there are very many.
You cherry pick one example and talk about there being many, many more. Yet it is the other side shows sources that you with few words "argue" are not valid - also without providing arguments, sources, anything.
You are not discussing in good faith.
What does the Talmud say about the Goyim?
>is it really so wrong for a nation to implement laws to preserve its culture, particularly when it's people constitute a tiny fraction of the global population
It's ok, natural and healthy for Israel, but not for the rest of the world, where that is nationalism and equates to ideologies of the 1930s.
You say that, but that's ridiculous. I can't become a citizen of any other country without that country's explicit permission, and many countries won't allow just anyone to immigrate.
Right, because the purpose of Israel is to be a Jewish state with a majority Jewish population to protect its Jewish residents from genocides, pogroms, blood libels, and other things that have been done to them for 2 millennia.
How the naturalization law prevents a marriage?
The good countries will refuse to issue a marriage license to you, the bad countries will send the police to watch as a mob lynches you.
If you see Israel as some kind of psuedo-western state, then yea, you should be shocked. But as a Middle Eastern country, this is just another Thursday. Personally, I don't see Israel any different than I see Turkey, Egypt, or Jordan.(Allies that get lots of money from the US with questionable behavior)
edit: I think is wrong by the way, so not justifying. This is just how things work in the Middle East - where nations do terrible things in the name of preserving their "religious" identity.
edit x2: Sources: 1. https://www.brookings.edu/blog/markaz/2016/06/20/what-egypt-... 2. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/may/02/persecution-dr... 3. Any of the State Dept religious freedoms reports here: https://www.state.gov/reports/2020-report-on-international-r...
You mean Muslim or Christian (either of which can be Arab).
Not all Arabs are Muslims and not all Muslims are Arabs.
It’s like saying that all who speak English are Christians. And all who are Christians speak English.
And there are Arabic speaking Muslims who don't consider themselves Arabs (e.g. in north Africa), as well as Arabic speaking christians who are Arabs (e.g. in Iraq).
This is incorrect. There is no distinction in the law between Arab Israelis and Jewish Israelis. The law applies equally to Israeli Jews who wish to marry a resident of the WB/Gaza, or one of the other countries mentioned in the law.
Because the jewish religious law (which many jews have to follow to peer pressure, even if they are not religious by themself) explicitely forbids marrying non jews and no one can convert to the jewish religion.
Muslims on the other hand can marry non muslims, but are supposed to convert them. So this is indeed way more comon.
Citation needed / this is not correct. It isn't easy, but it is perfectly kosher.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conversion_to_Judaism
Last time I checked - it seems I read a viewpoint from a rather orthodox rabbi (but his article was the first one, that showed up in google at that time, now I cannot find it anymore), which clearly stated, this is not possible at all, with no exception.
The only way, would be to recognized as a "lost jew", meaning being of jewish origin, who lost connection to the tribe (even some generations ago). And the recognition would need years of devotion.
It is not aligned with the vast majority of Jewish views about conversion to Judaism.
In general, conversion is possible. As far as I can tell there are even clearly-enough defined requirements.
Jews are not supposed to treat converts any differently than non-converts. People being people, this doesn't always happen, but that is the reasonable principle.
Given that Jews for centuries have not proselytized to non-Jews, many believe you cannot convert to Judaism. You can.
There is no problem for Israeli Jew to marry a resident of WB/Gaza who is also Israeli Jew. This happens all the time (except Gaza, no Israeli Jews live there).
Concept of Israeli Jew marrying a non-Jew (no matter the residency) doesn't exist in Israeli law.
The state may (but not obliged to) recognize the marriage registered abroad.
For non-Muslim non-Israeli spouses of Israeli Jews there is a 5+ year naturalization procedure where outcome is not guaranteed and every half a year one has to recount all the spots and birthmarks of significant other in front of state official to prove the marriage is not a fake.
This specific law is for Muslim non-Israeli spouses. Instead of 5+ year procedure it's just a firm "No".
There are plenty of Christian and Muslim citizens of Israel, and plenty of Christian and Muslim Palestinians, so the marriages don’t have to be inter-religious.
Inter-religious marriages are already impossible in Israel, and have been AFAIK forever (but you can fly to e.g. Cyprus to have one performed and it will be recognized in Israel).
Less than a year after the Holocaust Museum in DC opened its doors, proudly declaring "Never Again".
We had nothing to do with the holocaust. Germans and their friends were complicit.
Im genuinely interested in how come normal people of the world don’t really flinch at what Israel was allowed to do and what it keeps doing.
I don’t blame Israelis who were born there since we have little control over where we’re born and how we’re raised.
Apologies for the rant, but why does it make sense in the broader context to allow israeli actions that directly cause palestinian suffering if all of the jews’ suffering was caused by the germans?
As far as being banned in every Middle Eastern country… not true. I know a few Bahraini females married to Brits. Interracial and interreligous. In Lebanon, and Jordan, this happens between Christians and Muslims as well. Which countries would lynch you?
What different churches and such allow in terms of inter-marriage is left up to them, just like in, say, the US. But no laws prevent religious intermarriage.
But Israel must give citizenship to everyone... right?
Outrage of non-Israelis about is law is merely academical. Outrage of (some of) Israelis is practical: the state is putting a choice in front of a citizen -- be able to marry a person you want or be able to live in Israel.
And yes a double standard applies compared to other countries because Israel identifies as a western liberal democracy whereas the others don’t or no one implies that they seriously are.
Just to put some extra emphasis on quite how wrong this is: they are likely banned in almost no Middle Eastern country. Source: Married a woman from and in a Middle Eastern country under heavy sanctions just a few years ago.
Ironically, the law in question is not about the legality of the marriage, but about the rights of getting citizenship afterwards, and indeed, I would not be able to become a citizen of this country by way of my marriage, so in that sense, it is similar.
Honestly it seems like you're just making shit up.
Parent is spreading misinformation.
Anyway this is just wrong - even is some other countries do that.
0. https://www.brookings.edu/blog/markaz/2016/06/20/what-egypt-...
Just by the demographics alone, those guys will be in charge very soon. (or Israel will cease to be democratic).
So yes, Israel is not there yet, but well on its way. (and I have no problems with that, as long as they don't try to impose their religious values on me).
Israel is not "just like us". It is a country founded on a religion. It treats that religion as superior and grants it more status. To be harsh Israel is more like KSA and Iran.
absolutely disgusting
Don't be disgusted by unsubstantiated claims.
It includes the (IMHO not very convincing) figures that "Between 1993 and 2003, around 130,000 Palestinians were given Israeli citizenship or residency through family unification, including children, according to court filings. The Shin Bet security service told the Knesset on Monday that between 2001 and 2021, about 48 were involved in terror activities.”
48 of 130,000 amounts to 0.037% being involved in terrorist activities which seems very low to be used as justification for a law around security.
[0]: https://www.timesofisrael.com/after-coalition-battle-knesset...
Maybe it's more of an immigration policy than a security policy?
Fortunately, as we have learned over the past few weeks, sanctions are an effective means of pushback against archaic 20-th century statesmanship.
Pretty sure this was the reason. It’s a tactical piece that they want to keep control over. Everyone else in the region hates them (and rightfully so).
then if all else fails, they do sanctions, which of course NEVER affect the ruling class, they merely provide the rulers a tool to point more hatred at the west - you think it's the ruling class that can't get diabetes medication due to sanctions? No of course not, it's the average person.
Israel passed on confidential US military technology to China and abstained in the Security Council resolution against Russia. That's not the behaviour of a strong ally.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_General_Assem...
Im also interested in what you construe as evidence that Israel passed US confidential anything to China.
Not really. The war in Ukraine is intensifying. Russia sees the sanctions regime as an act of war. I'm not sure what the off ramp would be, and I generally support the sanctions. But I don't think your conclusions are sound. Pushback? Yes. Effective? Not so far.
The Israeli government definitely does a ton of problematic stuff that is objectively awful but it's just not quite the same as what the old government in my country used to do.
I am sure I will get downvoted for this, but the situation with Israel/Palestine is not quite the same as what existed in South Africa for a significant chunk of the 20th century. That doesn't mean it's a nice situation but really, I just would prefer it if people would stop trying to weld one shitty piece of history to another one to try and create this weird equivalency between the two.
In South Africa you could be a citizen regardless of your race, but how you were treated depended on your race; citizens were not equal.
In Israel, they are trying to prevent people of a certain race from becoming citizens, but once you are a citizen, there are fewer 'official' racist policies even if a lot of the people you have to deal with are outwardly racist anyway. On paper, citizens are (largely) equal.
You can make an analogy to apartheid. It's up to others to determine if the analogy fits the point you are making though.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_and_the_apartheid_ana...
This is a good point. Israel totally doesn't deny entry, immigration, work visa status, citizenship, and even recognition as Jewish to black Jews:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethiopian_Jews_in_Israel#Absor...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_Hebrew_Israelites_in_I...
And racism by itself doesn't appear to constitute apartheid.
We have a government over a people that determines the rights of each person based on who their parents were. That's the core concept that I, for one, am opposed to.
They aren't completely replacing race with religion, many Palestinians are black and my understanding is Israel is quite racist towards its black Jewish population as well. European Settler colonialism has historically been quite racist.
By black do you mean having darker skin tones?
If so, many Jewish Israelis are black - as are many Palestinians - and not just those that came to Israel from Ethiopia. Also, many Israelis are white (as in light skinned) as are many Palestinians.
The average Israeli is Mizrahi (of North African / Middle Eastern origin).
Apartheid refers to the implementation and maintenance of a system of legalized racial segregation in which one racial group is deprived of political and civil rights. Apartheid is a crime against humanity punishable under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. ACADEMIC TOPICS. legal history.
1) affirmative action does not remove any rights of those groups not targeted by affirmative action. It is possible to argue that by supporting one group, you are implicitly disadvantaging the out-group, but usually this distinction is important. E.g. having a "ladies night" at a bar is generally more acceptable than a "men pay double price" night.
2) affirmative action policies tend to target education and employment. The right to vote is typically is given higher priority when it comes to balancing different rights.
3) Affirmative action can be seen as targeting equal outcomes, not equal treatment[1]. My country offers free breast cancer screening to all women above a certain age. Men can certainly catch breast cancer, but it's far more dangerous to women, so a gender-blind outcome of "we want less people to die of breast cancer" has a gender-aware policy implementation. Most people wouldn't say that this policy is "medical apartheid" on the basis of gender. Similarly, you could say that affirmative action is about getting disparate groups to have equal outcomes in terms of whatever metric you care you measure (educational attainment, income, etc)
[1] not everyone agrees with this. Some people argue that preferential treatment should be given to groups that were historically persecuted (e.g. land confiscation), as remediation.
The Palestinians who stayed in Israel during the Israeli war of independence became citizens. The ones who left, did not. They were also not part of Israel for almost 30 years, they were refugees of other countries, who then attacked Israel.
They have never been Israeli citizens, and were not even in Israel for many years before they became Israeli refugees.
(Whether they should have been granted citizenship when the lands were annexed as part of the war, or not, is a different question)
I tried reading about the history of Palestinian nationality on wikipedia, and I have as many questions as answers. Are they Jordanian, Egyptian, Palestinian, or Israeli? Are some Palestinians stateless?
What does "territory" really mean?
> Honestly I'm really confused every time I try to understand Israel. Ordinary terms like citizenship, borders, immigration, and statehood are all in dispute
I'm not sure what you mean by in dispute here. Most of these are fairly well-defined when it comes to Israel. They're not even unique definitions - Sweden is the state of the Swedish ethnic group, Germany of Germans, Japan of the Japanese, etc. Israel in its conception is the land of the Jews.
There are complicating factors, which is that history you alluded to. While it certainly seems from the wiki article that the "historical Palestinian national identity" is something that is still argued about, I think the relevant part isn't so controversial.
Around the mid-19th century, the land that is now Israel (and was back then referred to as Palestine) had mostly Arab inhabitants, with a small Jewish population. Jews around the mid-19th century started a plan to go back to the lands they were removed from two thousand years prior - and many Jews started (legally) immigrating to Palestine and buying Palestinian lands. This caused there to be a fairly large Jewish population by the time 1948 came around.
Between 1900-1948, that land changed hands several times, eventually ending up under the rule of the UN, which made a plan to divide the land into a Jewish country and a Palestinian country. The Palestinians refused, and fled the land, as several Arab countries decided to attack Israel. Here there is some disagreement - were the Palestinians encouraged to flee by their leaders? Were they pushed out of Israel? Those are more disputed facts (I think for sure, some of both things happened.)
Israel won that war, effectively cementing most of modern day Israel, minus some (fairly large) territories. The Palestinians that stayed in Israel and didn't flee, became Israeli citizens. The hundreds of thousands of Palestinians that did flee became refugees in other countries.
Then the Six Day war happened. (Israelis generally consider the war to be started by others, though this is certainly disputed.) During this war, Israel took a bunch of extra territories, and with it, the Palestinian refugees. However, Israel didn't officially annex the regions or give the refugees citizenship, rather, kept them (and still to some extent keeps them) as refugees.
I think that's the majority of the story, from a (definitionally) Israeli perspectiev.
A single black and white case doesn't mean other cases don't involve nuance, or depend on your perspective.
2. What qualifies as “terrorism” in their book? Does throwing a rock at the IDF qualify as terrorism?
3. Why is Israel providing citizenship in the first place? What brought them to such an authoritative position? Who are the people they are giving citizenship to, where are they coming from, what were they subjugated to, why are they seeking citizenship in this place? The answers to these questions lie somewhere between Israeli far-right governance, oppression, human rights abuse and land imprisonment of a population who were kicked out of their homes and left stateless, passportless, and immobile, unable to cross their borders and travel, left to take long treks through abusive barriers and routes just to make it 5 miles from one place to another. Whose water is shut off, food supplies are limited, and have no economic prosperity. So why are these people the way they are, and seeking citizenship in such a place?
... and yet, we have laws that cut basic human rights because of the similar percentage of people dying from it.
As the Book of Ruth makes clear, Ruth herself was a formidable woman. From her descended famous Israeli offspring such as King David, King Solomon and, if you are Christian, Jesus Christ himself.