The above headline is taken right from Haaretz. Akiva Eldar wrote in 2009 about a report from the State Department's Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor which found:
The report says that the 1967 law on the protection of holy places refers to all religious groups in the country, including in Jerusalem, but "the government implements regulations only for Jewish sites. Non-Jewish holy sites do not enjoy legal protection under it because the government does not recognize them as official holy sites."
At the end of 2008, for example, all of the 137 officially recognized holy sites were Jewish. Moreover, Israel issued regulations for the identification, preservation and guarding of Jewish sites only. Many Christian and Muslim sites are said to be neglected, inaccessible or at risk of exploitation by real estate entrepreneurs and local authorities.
The report makes it clear that practices that have become routine in Israel are considered unacceptable in enlightened countries and should be corrected.
You can read the most recent State Department report here; it shows that many of these issues remain the same. To understand how and why this level of inequality continues it is useful to look at the Israel Democracy Institute's new Israeli Democracy Index for 2010 which was released today. It offers some very interesting data that sheds light on current Israeli (especially Jewish Israeli) views on democracy and the Jewish state. Here is a sampling of its findings:
86% of the Jewish public (76% of the total population) thinks that critical decisions for the state should be made by the Jewish majority.
53% of the Jewish public also believe that the State is entitled to encourage the emigration of Arabs.
81% of the population agrees with the assertion that “democracy is not a perfect regime, but it is better than any other form of government.” However, 55% of the public believes that Israel should put observing the law and public order before the ideals of democracy. Of the Jewish respondents, 60% of those on the political right supported this idea compared with 50% of those in the center and 49% of those on the left.
43% of the general population feels that it is equally important for Israel to be a Jewish and democratic country, while 31% regards the Jewish component as being more important, and only 20% defines the democratic element as being more important.
51% of the general public approves of equality of rights between Jews and Arabs. The more Orthodox the group, the greater the opposition to equal rights between Jews and Arabs: only 33.5% of secular Jews oppose this, compared with 51% of traditional Jews, 65% of Orthodox Jews and 72% of ultra-Orthodox Jews.
67% of the Jewish public believe that close relatives of Arabs should not be permitted to enter Israel under of the rubric of family unification.
Almost two-thirds (62%) of Jews believe that as long as Israel is in conflict with the Palestinians, the views of Arab citizens of Israel on foreign policy and security matters should not be taken into consideration.
55% of the general public thinks that more resources should be allocated to Jewish municipalities than to Arab municipalities, while a 42% minority disagrees with this statement.
Within the Jewish public, 71% of right-wing supporters agree that more resources should be allocated to Jewish municipalities than to Arab municipalities, as compared to 46% of centrists and 38% of leftists. When segmented by degree of religious observance, 51% of ultra-Orthodox Jews agree with the statement, while 45% of Orthodox Jews, 28% of traditional Jews, and 18% of secular Jews agree with it.
46% of the Jewish public admitted to being most bothered by Arabs, followed equally by people with cognitive disabilities living in the community. 39% were bothered by foreign workers, 25% would be bothered by same-sex couples, 23% by ultra-Orthodox Jews, 17% by Ethiopian immigrants, 10% by non-Sabbath observers, and 8% by immigrants from the Former Soviet Union.
The Arab public is less tolerant than Jews of neighbors who are “Other.” 70% thought the least desirable neighbors would be same-sex couples and 67% were opposed to having ultra-Orthodox Jews as neighbors, followed closely by 65% who would be opposed to former settlers. 48% answered that the most “tolerable” neighbors would be foreign workers.
You can read the whole report here.
unless i’m reading it wrong it appears the haaretz article was written 2 years ago but the Israel Democracy Institute report is new.
Yikes, thanks Annie for catching that!
The post has been updated
all of these percentages for the demographics wrt political views reminded me very much of uri avnery’s post from the other day called The Original Sin about how the idea of zionism within the jewish community has transformed since israel’s ‘founding’. and along w/it judaism as it is practiced in israel. the focus is on the nationalist religious movement. he’s very blunt.
this kind of pampered socialism for one part of society compared to the utter dearth of funds for other parts vs the different working classes is a recipe for disaster.
Annie,
re: Uri Avnery’s gripe, Israel has only itself to blame. They choose to ally themselves with “parasites and rabbis who emit an odor of fascism” (Avnery’s words) so as to avoid power-sharing with westernized, educated Israeli Palestinians.
Israel has chosen religious and ethnic bonds over shared outlooks.
In other words, it favors the “Jewish” component over the “democratic” component.
Israel is Jewish first and democratic, second.
thank you for everything adam, i don’t tell you enough. much much much appreciated.
good catch Annie. Thanks Adam
One of Ed Teller’s (Phil Munger)
How Many Fucking Foreign Armies Get to Recruit on U.S. Campuses? – One
link to my.firedoglake.com
What do folks know about trips paid and taken to Israel by our congress people being exempt from the same standards applied to trips taken by our congress people to other countries?
thanks kathleen. that cole link is a doozy too.
What do folks know about trips paid and taken to Israel by our congress people being exempt from the same standards applied to trips taken by our congress people to other countries?
i know a few days after the bailout was announced when some kansas critter from tennessse or kansas or some biblebelt place headed off to israel some tea party constituents of his made a big screaming fit out of it with signs and all at the airport and placed it on her blog. i’ve never seen a tea partier capitulate so fast! she was faced w/an onslaught of criticism trying to educate her israel was ..well…different. needless to say the video and all reference to the occasion disappeared lickity split.
lol
I believe it was here at Mondoweiss that I read that the I lobby somehow was able to exempt trips to Israel paid by groups for congress people off the list of no paid trips for our congress people after new legislation was passed about this a while back.
Whoa Juan Cole cutting to the core
link to juancole.com
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Gaza as Israel’s Gimp
Posted on November 30, 2010 by Juan
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In Quentin Tarantino’s camp noir classic, Pulp Fiction, the Bruce Willis and Ving Rhames characters have an altercation and one chases the other into a pawn shop, the proprietor of which is a Maynard who has a friend Zed. They capture Marsellus (Rhames) and have their way with him as a man in a bondage suit (the “Gimp”) watches. It has long struck me that the Israelis are playing Maynard to Gaza’s Gimp or Marsellus. They are keeping the Palestinians of Gaza in their metaphorical basement, dressed up for abuse, which they visit on them regularly. The Israeli blockade of Gaza is not a policy. Policies are rational, have bounds, have attainable goals. What has the blockade accomplished? When will it end? How can it be justified given it breaks about ten major international laws? How can it be justified given that it is contrary to everything in Jewish ethics (would Israelis like to have their children blockaded that way, is the question Rabbi Hillel would ask). It is not a policy. It is a piece of sadism on a mass scale.
Gisha.org recently managed to get released Israeli documents that spell out the blockade policies in Gaza and what underlies them. There was a deliberate policy of under-supply, of not letting in quite enough fuel to keep electricity going, of denying people ‘luxuries,’ of punishing them in petty ways that have nothing to do with Israeli security. Of treating the Palestinians of Gaza, including the little children, like so many Gimps.
Prior to the native regaining her homeland from the European settlers, had the latter been queried as to their feelings towards natives, wouldn’t polls have revealed the same intolerance for and dislike of the native among, say, Afrikaners as among these Jewish settlers* in Israel, the same intolerance among the Pied-Noir in Algeria; likewise, the same intolerance (had polls existed back then) among the Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth Rock? What it boils down to is that by whatever name, the colonizer is one intolerant racist no good SOB!
“Moreover, Israel issued regulations for the identification, preservation and guarding of Jewish sites only.”
One more way for the Israeli government to humiliate the Palestinian people. So f—ed up.
Chomsky said on Democracy Now! this morning that the U.S. Ambassador to Israel reported falsehoods to Washington on the circumstances that led up to the Gaza war of 2008-9.
link to letters.salon.com
I notice how you all ignore this part:
“The Arab public is less tolerant than Jews of neighbors who are “Other.” 70% thought the least desirable neighbors would be same-sex couples and 67% were opposed to having ultra-Orthodox Jews as neighbors, followed closely by 65% who would be opposed to former settlers. 48% answered that the most “tolerable” neighbors would be foreign workers.”
You know, hophmi, you’re like a spoiled child: ‘But look what they do! If they can do it, so can we, and that makes it all right!’
>> You know, hophmi, you’re like a spoiled child: ‘But look what they do! If they can do it, so can we, and that makes it all right!’
That’s because Israel is “a good in the world”, a Zionist “mix of defense and offense” that some people consider a “moral work”. The fact that Israel is actually *less* immoral than “Ay-rabs” and Saudis proves the superior nature of the Zio-supremacist ideology and dream.
Perhaps he is not “Super-Man”, but at least he’s better than “Saudi-Man”…and that’s gotta count for something!
eljay, are you aware that “ethnic cleasing is not necessary at this time”? Doesn’t that count for anything?
BTW, be sure to read the section in that thesis on “Askenazi Jews and Whiteness” It’s a dilly, and the stuff about the GI bill and the post WW2 Jewish experience in America is pretty much how I remember it.
She seems to be saying that Phil’s Jewish meritocracy is pretty much affimative action for white people in which the Jews were included, and it went to our heads.
Oh gawd the narcissism of zionists knows no bounds..
You remind me of Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction, you boil the Palestinian bunny then whinge and whine endlessly when they don’t love you.
33% of Arabs were not opposed to having ultra-Orthodox Jews as neighbors?
I’m astonished. I didn’t know anyone anywhere would accept them as neighbours
hophmi needs to change his user name to “tu quoque”
didn’t ignore it we can figure out the context behind even if you can’t
“The situation is absurd: the state is paying for the upkeep of a large and growing population of Torah-shielded parasites, who undermine the state. The state pays hundreds of thousands of young religious people in order to keep them from – God forbid – working.”
Wow, I’m feeling a new upsurge of religiosity, and an overpowering desire to get in touch with my Ultra-Orthodox roots. Having been raised Reform, though, I was always discouraged from spitting and bullying. Awful how assimilation severs a guy from his roots, ain’t it?
For the liberal, Jewish readers of Mondoweiss who may care about this kind of stuff:
This religious discrimination is applied internally, against Jews. The Israeli prime minister’s office has designated a site next to the Western Wall in Jerusalem as the holiest synagogue for non-Israeli Jews. Yet, the government does not consider this site to be sacred (why are government agencies in the business of sanctifying bits of land is another question).
So, a non-Orthodox synagogue is, per Israel, not holy – because it is not of the right religious denomination.
“(why are the government agencies in the bussiness of sanctifying bits of land…)”
Guide to the perplexed: one of the more confusing systems of government is Liberal Theocracy. There are basically only two good examples: Iran and Israel. To have a good point of reference, consider Saudi Arabia as a standard Theocracy.
Surely, if the theocratic state will not declare pieces of land to be holy, who can? Why a piece of land was reserved for religious observances and not declared holy? Because those are observances of heretics. And why this land was given to heretics? Because the Theocracy is liberal.
Israel mistreats infidels and tolerates heretics. Iran mistreats heretics and tolerates infidels. Saudi Arabia persecutes both.
From this point of view, nothing more logical than “the state is paying for the upkeep of a large and growing population of Torah-shielded parasites”. Basically, heretics pay a tax to support the faithful. The Prophet invented this treatment for infidels, so one can say that Jews copied that idea from the Muslim, except that they reversed the roles of infidels and heretics.
Comparisons with Iran are pointless. Israel is a puerile state. There is only Jewish history in Israel. where were the Askenazis in the 12 century? somewhere else.
The Zionist narrative is a fairytale.
this really isn’t all that surprising. it has been my expierence that the jewish supporters of ISrael ( and jewish Israelis)to be some of the most intolerant and bigoted people in the world. some of it being rather ironic if sickening