Israel and Racism - Imagine this law here - bout travellers or protestants

Tuesday July 09, 2002 13:27

by Blisset

the new bill took the institutionalized racism even further.

TEL AVIV: The right-wing government of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has approved a bill that sparked wide criticism of social discrimination and racism against Arabs. Israel, often referred to as the Jewish State, has passed many laws in the past that institute racism, but the new bill took the institutionalized racism even further.

TEL AVIV: The right-wing government of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has approved a bill that sparked wide criticism of social discrimination and racism against Arabs. Israel, often referred to as the Jewish State, has passed many laws in the past that institute racism, but the new bill took the institutionalized racism even further.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's coalition government has reportedly backed a proposed law that would bar the Arab citizens of Israel from buying homes on “state-owned land.” Israeli media say the proposal is aimed at allowing Israeli officials to allocate lands for the sole purpose of establishing exclusively Jewish communities.

Opponents, including Israeli Attorney General Eliyakim Rubinstein, say the bill amounts to a form of racial discrimination. Rubinstein issued a statement Monday urging cabinet members to withhold support for the measure, and Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said his Labor Party will fight the proposal.

But the support in the government is any thing but uncertain as the cabinet voted 17-2 Sunday in favor of the bill, which was authored by a member of the ultra-conservative National Religious Party.

The bill must pass through three readings in the Israeli parliament and could face a challenge in the High Court before becoming law.

Sharon’s government justified the racism law saying that it approved the bill, enabling state land to be reserved for Jews only "for security reasons".

The text, sponsored by rabbi Haim Druckman, a deputy for the far-right National Religious Party, to overturn a March 2000 ruling by the Supreme Court, was approved by 17 ministers to two late Sunday, a government official said.

Human rights groups, the main opposition party, the government's legal advisor and Foreign Minister Shimon Peres all criticized the move, which Druckman for his part called a "victory for Zionism."

The measure, which still has to be approved by the Israeli parliament, stems from a suit brought to the Supreme Court by Adel Kaadan, an Israeli Arab who wished to buy land in the “cooperative village” of Katzir in Galilee, but was rejected because he was an Arab.

"This regrettable decision by the Israeli cabinet amounts to apartheid," Kaadan told the Israeli daily Maariv.

ACRI, which has been representing the Kaadan family's case, slammed the decision, saying the state was prohibited from discriminating against its citizens in the allotment of public lands.

"The Kaadan family's battle ... is a legal struggle over the nature of democracy in Israel, as defined in the Israeli Declaration of Independence," the organization said in a statement.

"The treatment of Arab citizens by the state as enemies until proven otherwise has no place in a democracy. This prejudicial attitude must not be given expression in the discrimination against citizens based on their national origin."

Attorney general and government legal advisor Elyakim Rubinstein urged ministers not to support the bill when it came before the Knesset, saying it would widen the rift between Jews and Arabs, the daily Haaretz reported.

Rubenstein said the bill was unnecessary, adding that the pursuit of equality between Jews and Arabs does not run counter to the realization of Zionism.

The Supreme Court ruling in the Katzir case was not the end of Zionism, he added.
The decision was rejected out of hand as "racist" by Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and the Labour party.

"No other government in the democratic world would have adopted such a law," fumed Yossi Sarid, head of the opposition Meretz party.

Although Israel refers to itself as the “Middle East only democracy“, growing evidence runs counter to such a claim.