Religious Pluralism

Rebecca Manski

As a child in Israel, I often heard the lament: “If the Palestinians had simply accepted Israeli citizenship, this conflict would never have occurred.” When I returned 15 years later, I heard many Israelis say of the Arabs who did in fact accept Israeli citizenship: “If they only served the country as we do, in the military, we would feel better about providing them with services.” Yet the experience of the Negev Bedouin, people who accepted Israeli citizenship and until recently, generally served in the army, shows that this is not the case. ...

12/2006

YNet –

We did not spill blood for this land in order to adopt Western culture – we could have easily assimilated in the days of the Hellenists and the Crusaders and disappeared from the world. On the other hand, if we have already attained this land, why do we continue to insist on calling ourselves “the chosen people”  --  a people that does whatever it feels like and turns its back on those weaker than itself, on those among it who are weak and on those who are willing to do anything in order to belong?

A conversation on identity and values, then and now ............

12/06/2006

On December 6, 2006 Meretz Chairman Yossi Beilin introduced in the Knesset a bill that would require Israel's Population Registry to register as Jews all Israelis born of Jewish fathers. The bill applies to hundreds of thousands of Jews from the FSU (former Soviet Union) and countless thousands whose Jewishness is acknowledged by the Reform Movement. He published an op-ed in Yediot Aharonot on the subject.