Leon Hadar writes:
I'm attaching a link to an interesting piece by an Israeli writer, Ofra Yeshua-Lyth, who raises an issue –religious identity cards–that should concern American-Jewish liberals/libertarians who assume that Israel is "like America." A few years ago I was staying in a hotel in Athens when Greek-Orthodox religious leaders were campaigning against a plan to remove the religious identity of Greek citizens from their identity cards, which was one of the demands from Brussels that the Greeks had to accept as part of joining the EU. I was having a breakfast with an American-Jewish lady from Marin County, CA, who expressed astonishment that Greece had required citizens to list their religion. "Like in the Dark Ages," she complained. And of course she refused to believe me when I told her that Israel requires citizens to list both their "nationality" and religion on identity card (in the case of Jews, nationality=religion=Jewish).
Yeshua Lyth:
be a member of a nationalistic Jewish underground in the days before
the state of Israel was created. In the last eight years Ornan is
leading a group of about forty Israelis – most of them Jews according
to all religious criteria – who have taken a court action against the
state of Israel, demanding to be registered as "Israeli nationals"
rather than have their nationality defined by religion or ethnic origin
(e.g. Jewish or Arab).
A few thousand Israelis have signed some years
ago on the "I am an Israeli declaration."
It could help transform Israel's national identity, in an angry neighborhood:
that might have been created in thinly populated areas of Finland or
Canada. How long would it have taken to the local native minority to
crystallize into an angry underprivileged group vehemently opposing the
regime which discriminates against it? And how would Scandinavian or
Canadian neighbors, world famous for their good nature, react to the
way their relatives in the "Jewish Area" are treated?…
