Israel’s worrisome path

Arabs are not the only target. The Knesset passed a law in February imposing onerous reporting requirements on non-governmental organizations to disclose funding from foreign governments, a move seen as intended to stifle the documentation ofIsraeli human rights abuses.

Israeli, Palestinian, and international human rights organizations have all condemned these laws. Human Rights Watch issued a statement saying that they “threaten Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel and others with yet more officially sanctioned discrimination…Israeli parliamentarians should be working hard to end glaring inequality, not pushing through discriminatory laws to control who can live where and to create a single government-approved view of Israel’s history.”

Meanwhile, anti-Arab racism and incitement has grown to alarming levels in Israeli society. In January, Rabbi Dov Lior, a senior figure in the Religious Zionism movement, warned against Jewish women marrying non-Jewish men, saying that “Gentile sperm leads to barbaric offspring”. Last October, a group of prominent rabbis on the government payroll wrote an open letter urging Jews “to refrain from renting or selling apartments to non-Jews”. And last summer, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, the spiritual leader of the Shas Party, which is a part of Israel’s coalition government, said that Gentiles exist only to “serve” Jews, declaring,  “They will work, they will plow, they will reap. We will sit like an effendi and eat. That is why gentiles were created.” A month earlier, Yosef described Palestinians as “evil, bitter enemies” and called on god to make them “perish from this world” by striking them with a plague.

In this type of political climate, is it any wonder that a recent poll showed that 46 percent of young Israeli Jews believe that the rights of Arab citizens of Israel should be revoked? Or that a similar poll taken last year revealed that half of Israeli Jewish students don’t want Arabs in their classrooms? This is the inevitable result of the racism and intolerance being espoused by senior Israeli political and religious leaders. This systematic racism and discrimination isn’t limited to the Arab community. Other ethnic and religious groups in Israel, such as the Ethiopian, Russian, and Mizrachi communities experience it as well on more subtle levels.

Ironically, Palestinian citizens of Israel are uniquely placed to help heal the rift between Israelis and Palestinians, Arabs and Jews. But rather than use this community’s potential for peace building, extremists, both inside and outside the Knesset, are attempting to suppress its voice and risk inciting its young people to violence. Increased conflict between the Jewish majority and Palestinian minority of Israel will only further complicate the overall situation in the region.

If Israel wants to continue calling itself a liberal democracy and be considered as such by the international community, it must halt its downward slide towards intolerance and authoritarianism and respect the rights of all of its citizens. And if Americans want to live up to their noble ideals and rhetoric about promoting human rights and freedom around the world, they must ensure that their Israeli friends and allies understand and uphold those ideals as well.

Jafar Farah is director of the Mossawa Center, the Advocacy Center for Arab Citizens in Israel. Dr. Alla Shainskaya is Chairwoman of the board of Our Heritage, Charter for Democracy.