MK Levin said:
“This is a Jewish state that’s a democracy, not a democracy with some Jewish elements. We need to strengthen these principles, and give them legal priority.”
Exactly.
Protecting Jewish national rights should be the supreme value. That’s democratic.
Talks between Yesh Atid, Likud Beytenu, Bayit Yehudi break down; Yesh Atid submits bill while Levin, Shaked work on own bill.
On Tuesday morning, MK Ruth Calderon (Yesh Atid) submitted “Basic Law: Independence Scroll,” while coalition chairman Yariv Levin (Likud Beytenu), Bayit Yehudi faction chairwoman Ayelet Shaked and Yisrael Beytenu faction chairman Robert Ilatov submitted “Basic Law: Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People” hours later.
Calderon, Levin and Shaked worked together for the last month in hopes of drafting an agreed-upon version of “Basic Law: Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People.” Shaked and Calderon began talks several weeks earlier, and Levin joined in after proposing a similar bill.
The bills are meant to anchor in legislation the definition of the State of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state.
There are several versions of the bill, beginning with one proposed by former Kadima MK Avi Dichter in the last Knesset. Each defines Israel differently.
The Likud Beytenu-Bayit Yehudi legislation seeks to balance the values of Judaism and democracy as expressed in the Independence Scroll, while the Yesh Atid bill turns the scroll itself into a Basic Law.
“We tried to reach broad agreements and made a major effort to reach an agreed-upon draft,” Levin said. “Unfortunately, we could not reach an unequivocal agreement on the matter, but the current [Likud Beytenu-Bayit Yehudi] draft certainly reflects a very wide Israeli consensus, and is important to the character of the State of Israel, which is influenced by this dialogue.”
Levin, Shaked and Ilatov’s bill also mentions the Jewish People’s historic right to the Land of Israel, stating that the State of Israel cannot exist anywhere but the Land of Israel.
Another article in the Likud Beytenu-Bayit Yehudi bill says all citizens have equal civil rights, regardless of religion or ethnicity.
The bill also includes an article giving it equal legal standing to Basic Law: Human Dignity and Freedom.
“Elements in and out of the Knesset are trying to harm the Jewish character of the state in recent years, and want to turn it into a ‘state of all its citizens,’” Shaked stated. “The State of Israel was founded as the Jewish State, and it must remain that way. We must stop the continuing erosion of the Jewish foundations of the state.”
Calderon’s version of the bill recognizes the Independence Scroll as the founding document of the State of Israel and a basis for legal dispute and matters of identity.
“As long as we don’t have a constitution,” Calderon wrote in the bill’s explanatory section, “the Independence Scroll is a basic, recognized legal document with important principles of the country’s identity.”
The Yesh Atid MK added that the courts have used the document and its principles for decades.
The bill is meant to declare Israel as a Jewish State, but Calderon emphasized that she means Judaism as a nation and culture, not a religion.
At the same time, the legislation says Israel commits to protect human rights of all its citizens and residents, regardless of ethnicity, religion or gender.
“The desire to have a state with Jewish character while maintaining equal rights is clearly expressed in the Independence Scroll,” Calderon explained. “The scroll is a balanced, Jewish and democratic document based on principles of justice and equality that are no less relevant today than at the time it was written.”
Both bills removed a controversial article from Dichter’s version, declaring Hebrew alone – and not Arabic – the official language of Israel.
None of the involved parties would disclose what led talks to break down this week.
However, last month, Calderon wrote angry Facebook posts denying claims by Ha’aretz that she supports the Basic Law requiring the courts to put Israel’s Jewish identity before its democratic values.
“The law that I am promoting, for a Jewish and democratic state, is meant to fix the dangers of Dichter’s bill and doesn’t even hint at making democracy subordinate to Jewish identity,” she wrote.
Days earlier, Levin told The Jerusalem Post: “This is a Jewish state that’s a democracy, not a democracy with some Jewish elements. We need to strengthen these principles, and give them legal priority.”
Levin explained that legal precedent gives equality under law priority over “Judaizing the land,” as he called it, but his bill would ensure that the Jewish nature of the Land of Israel comes first.
@ XLucid:Yes and no. Yes, those laws exist and no, they don’t go far enough. When the high Court has to decide if a law is acceptable, it must pass the democracy test, not the Jewish test if there was one. What is needed is a constitution or basic law that says that the Jewish character of the state, as we choose to define it, must take precedent even if it results in discrimination. The proposed legislation aims to do just that.
It was important to outline that all levels of government are handed over by political people – left and right – conspicuous by their incompetency, recklessness and irresponsibility who gamble and play poker with the future of Eretz Israel and the Jewish People as a whole.
XLucid Said:
The only thing “Jewish” about laws is the “Right of Return”, which has allowed 100s of 1000s of non-Jews to be classified as Jews.
XLucid Said:
Israel’s leftist Supreme Court has made a mockery of the law both by failing to uphold the primacy of Israel as a Jewish State and by refusing to follow the law’s mandate to ban anti-Zionist and anti-Israel parties from running for the Knesset. As a result, the law has been drained of all practical significance as far as upholding Israel’s Jewish character is concerned. This is the situation the proposed new Basic Law is intended to address.
The purpose of adopting a law is intended to ensure that the authorities and citizens and comply with them to their fullest extent. The laws referring to Israel as a Jewish State and democratic State exist already.
The following is an Israeli Basic Law stating that the State of Israel is a Jewish and democratic state:
BASIC LAW: HUMAN DIGNITY AND LIBERTY
1. The purpose of this Basic Law is to protect human dignity and liberty, in order to establish in a Basic Law the values of the State of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state.
The following is an Israeli Basic Law preventing and forbidding the election of candidates who deny the State of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state:
BASIC LAW: THE KNESSET
Prevention of Participation of Candidate’s List.
“7A. A candidates’ list shall not participate in elections to the Knesset if its objects or actions, expressly or by implication, include one of the following:
(1) negation of the existence of the State of Israel as the state of the Jewish people;
(2) negation of the democratic character of the State;
(3) incitement to racism.”.
The big problem is the lack of basic knowledge affecting the deputies in Israel. The least they can do should be to be aware of and learn the basic laws governing the country they seek to represent, before submitting their candidacy for the position of deputy.
@ NormanF:
Norman, that make a lot of sense.
Being non-Jewish I don’t really understand the variations of Jews.
Would make a lot of sense if all would come together as one under G-d.
Kind of like “United we stand, divided we fall”
“Pick & choose” Judaism.
No thanks.
The problem is that in post-Zionist Israel, no consensus exists on a core culture and national values. A Jewish State should be a fundamental constitutional principle in Israel law to which all the rest are subordinate. This is not likely to happen because Israeli Jews cannot agree on the meaning of a Jewish State. And the Arabs are quite right that why should they recognize Israel as a Jewish State when the Jews themselves cannot agree on what it means? Its a national tragedy that formulating a Basic Law on this subject has revealed such wide gaps in Israeli Jewish society instead of serving to bring the Jewish people together in the love and defense of their homeland.