MESOPOTAMIA NEWS TOP OF THE AGENDA – A SHAMEFUL DECISION IN ISRAEL

TOP OF THE AGENDA

Israel Adopts Controversial Nationality Law

The Knesset, Israel’s parliament, voted 62–55 to pass a contentious law (Haaretz) that defines Israel as the “national home of the Jewish people” and states that Jews have the exclusive right to self-determination in Israel, prompting outcry from the country’s Arab lawmakers

The law defines Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, downgrades Arabic from an official language (Ynet) to one of “special status,” and says the state will promote the establishment of Jewish settlements. Lawmakers from the country’s Arab minority, which comprises about one-fifth (Reuters) of Israel’s population, decried the vote as enshrining racial discrimination.

ANALYSIS

“There is no country in the world that has not specifically enumerated the right of equality in its constitution—therefore, it is difficult to understand why the authors of this bill insist not to include this important value,” Amir Fuchs said in an interview with CNN.

“Considering the number of discriminatory laws already on the books (from family unification, immigration, land ownership, housing discrimination, etc.), it’s not a stretch to imagine any number of situations in which the courts determine ‘Jewish’ rights to trump principles of equality once the Nation-State Law is passed,” Michael Schaeffer Omer-Man writes for +972 Magazine.

“There is no reason why a Jewish nation-state bill has to be problematic on its face; the problem is not with the idea, but with the execution. In this instance, the nation-state bill doesn’t sit well because it needs to be based on a vision of ethical nationalism, but is instead based on an exclusive vision of nationalism that strikes a jarringly discordant note,” Michael Koplow writes for Forward.