Jewish identity

While I disagree with some of what is written below the article stands as a wake up call to all Jews who both love our ancient homeland and dery the continued attempts by Haredim to dis-enfranchise any Jew who does not follow the dictates of the "mullah like rabbinut" in Israel.

We can see what this can lead to by reading the morning news on a daily basis of the strife, the killings, the murders that take place in the name of Allah between the Sunni and Shia sects of Islam.

Do we want Judaism to sink to that level?
Read on.

Judaism and racism

By Avirama Golan

Tags: israel news

For years it was hard to swallow the comparisons that some observers on the left made between Israel and South Africa, and especially their use of the word apartheid, which seemed exaggerated and even harmful when applied to a complicated conflict. But in recent years, it has become impossible to continue hiding our heads in the sand: Israel is rapidly losing the last vestiges of its humane posturing and is closing its heart and conscience not only to Palestinians in the territories, but to anyone who, quite simply, is not Jewish. The most blatant embodiment of this phenomenon is the policy adopted by a unit of the Interior Ministry's Population Administration that Yaakov Ganot set up and runs. The Interior Ministry is headed by a minister who does not even pretend to represent humanistic and universal values; rather, he sees himself as Judaism's gatekeeper. But this is a very particular kind of Judaism - ultra-Orthodox, separatist and closed off. Most of the world's Jews have nothing to do with this kind of Judaism, but successive Israeli governments have bound themselves to its doorposts. Now Ganot is promising that the new unit will soon start arresting and deporting even families with children. "The children do not extend protection to their parents," he told Haaretz reporter Nurit Wurgaft last month. That overturns a decision by two previous interior ministers, Avraham Poraz and Ophir Pines-Paz, who promised to grant citizenship to families whose children were born, raised and educated in Israel and have no citizenship or identity other than their Israeli one. (And therefore effectively have nowhere to "return" to, meaning they are being sentenced to perpetual migrant status.) We can rely on Ganot to keep his word. He is a talented, hardworking man. But he is not the one who set this policy; he is merely happy to implement it. The link between Shas' version of Judaism and the foreign workers goes far deeper and is far more significant than Ganot's plans. After all, it would be possible to argue, as the government does, that Israel is deporting foreign workers as part of its battle against unemployment to enable Israelis to earn an honorable living. But if so, why is the government allowing the importation of more than 20,000 foreign agricultural workers this year, just as it has in previous years? This cynical move proves just how deceptive the unemployment pretext is. At the start of the coalition negotiations, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised Agriculture Minister Shalom Simhon that the agriculture lobby would not be harmed, so this is a game whose rules were known in advance. And the key rule is this: The government seeks battalions of foreign workers who will come, work and leave, but it will violently persecute anyone who threatens population groups with strong lobbies. Some of these will be banished from the center of the country to the outskirts, but most will simply be sent to jail, and then to the planes. And this is where the link to Shas comes in. The Filipinas who bathe our elderly, the Chinese who build our luxury towers and the Thais who cultivate our fruits and vegetables for export often displace Israel's Arab citizens. These citizens have no lobby, and no one cares about them or their lack of employment. In contrast, the Africans, South Americans, Ukrainians and all the rest, who clean houses and do other household scut work, displace a different group - the Jewish lower class. This group includes both poor, uneducated women, for whom housecleaning and other household tasks are virtually the only jobs they can find, and poor, uneducated men, who earn their living by painting, plastering, doing minor repairs, cleaning stairwells and so forth. Israeli homeowners prefer the cheap, obedient foreigners, who are willing to do any job with no social benefits, to Israeli workers, whom they deem "pampered." But these Israelis, though lacking power, are Shas' target electorate, so in practice, they have a strong lobby. And this lobby is using Jewish purity as a means to keep out foreigners - and especially those with families  who dream of immigrating. The absurd situation whereby Israel persecutes some foreigners while inviting in other "legal" foreigners indeed stems from economic reasons, but these reasons are perverted and deceptive. The lie that conceals them wraps itself in a mantle of ethnocentrism and racism, which is even more embarrassing than the embarrassments it seeks to hide. Like other countries, Israel treats foreigners cruelly. But unlike most of these countries, it bases this cruelty on its ethnic and religious identity, in particular, Jewish identity.