On Friday, June 18, 2004, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz published an interview conducted by two of its staff members with Yasser Arafat. Without getting into how deplorable it is for two Israelis to sit and talk with the person responsible for the brutal deaths of hundreds of innocent Jewish men, women and babies, during the interview, Arafat actually made a very valid point.
Some background information is necessary. Firstly, perhaps the biggest obstacle Israel faces in making peace with the Arabs is the issue of the "right of return". The Arabs will not make peace with Israel unless Israel agrees to allow all the Arabs who left Israel after the establishment of Israel in 1948 and the Israeli victory in the Six Day War in 1967, and all of their descendants, to return to Israel. Israel claims that these "refugees" should only have the right to return to the newly created Palestinian state and not to Israel, arguing that if it allows all these Arabs to come and become citizens in Israel, Israel, as a democracy, will fall into the hands of the new majority, compromised of Arabs. Israel will lose its "Jewish character". Therefore, if Israel were to accept the "right of return", the outcome of such a peace agreement would be one Palestinian State in the West Bank and Gaza and another democracy called Israel, ruled by a majority of Arabs. Thus, Israel maintains, the Jewish State would be forever and altogether destroyed. There is not a single Israeli Jew who accepts such an outcome.
The second factual issue of note is that during the 1990s, Israel absorbed millions of immigrants from the former Soviet Union. Under Israel's flawed Law of Return, any person who has at least one Jewish grandparent has an automatic right to live in Israel. Judaic law maintains that a person is a Jew only if that person's mother is Jewish. As a result, a large percentage of those who immigrated to Israel from the former Soviet Union are not Jewish according to Jewish law.
In the Haaretz interview, Arafat was asked, "What about a solution that can allay Israeli concerns about a flood of refugees?"
His response was on the mark:
"Look, look, I discussed this matter clearly and obviously in Camp David with President Clinton and with Barak. [After a long aside about student days in Cairo, Arafat referred to a purported clipping, from Haaretz, that he carries with him. - BBH] It is still in my pocket, I will give it to you to see it: 62 percent of those who came [to Israel] from the Soviet Union, are not Jews; 90 percent of these are Christians and 10 percent are Muslims. And I told Clinton, okay, if they are accepting those 62 percent - they have become 70 percent by now - why not to give the chance for our people?"
Arafat then added, "Why the Muslim from Russia has a right to return and the Muslim from Palestine has not the right to return? And why the Christian from Russia has the right to come and the Palestinian Christian has not the right to come?"
In essence, Arafat was stumbling across a much more important issue. Israel and Israelis will jump up and down, kick and scream, be stubborn and insist that Israel must maintain its "Jewish character". Arafat asks, "What Jewish character?" What makes Israel a Jewish State? The fact that many Jews live in Israel does not make Israel a Jewish State any more than New York is a Jewish State with its two-three million Jewish inhabitants.
On June 14, 2004, the Israeli Supreme Court decided that Israeli municipalities must permit the sale of pork where a majority of residents demand it. Under current Israeli law, it is up to municipalities to decide whether to permit the sale of pork. Several towns have tried to limit the sale of pork or have banned it altogether. The nine-judge panel annulled existing local laws and said new regulations must be devised to reflect the true wishes of residents. Pork sales must be allowed in neighborhoods where a majority of residents want to buy it, the judges said. In areas where pork-buying residents are a minority, they must be able to have easy access to neighborhoods where it is sold; and in areas where the makeup of the neighborhood is not clear, the city must determine the opinion of the residents, the judges ruled.
As Michael Freund wrote in the Jerusalem Post, the judges completely missed the point. The ban on the sale of pork was not instituted to alleviate the sensitivities of observant Jews. It is wrong to prohibit one person's freedom because of another person's sensibilities. The issue here is not the rights of individuals. The ban was there to maintain the "Jewish character" of the State of Israel. A Jewish state should have a law on its books forbidding the sale of food that epitomizes Jewish dietary restrictions. Every person in the free world knows that pork is not "Jewish". Yet, nine members of the Israeli Supreme Court seemed to ignore it.
Like Israel's Law of Return, this decision is another attempt by the Supreme Court to redefine "Jewish character." The Jewish nation is thousands of years old and no matter what country or continent our tribulations have taken us, we, for the most part, remained unchanged. For thousands of years, we all knew what Jewish meant. Now, comes the Supreme Court and discards all that is Jewish and recreates an entire religion.
Israel must decide now whether Arafat is right or wrong. Israel must decide whether the State will have a Jewish character or not. If Israel chooses to abandon its Jewish identity, then what is the point of it? If Israel chooses to abandon its Jewish character, then Arafat is right - Israel ought to allow the Arab refugees in Lebanon to come and rule.
Some background information is necessary. Firstly, perhaps the biggest obstacle Israel faces in making peace with the Arabs is the issue of the "right of return". The Arabs will not make peace with Israel unless Israel agrees to allow all the Arabs who left Israel after the establishment of Israel in 1948 and the Israeli victory in the Six Day War in 1967, and all of their descendants, to return to Israel. Israel claims that these "refugees" should only have the right to return to the newly created Palestinian state and not to Israel, arguing that if it allows all these Arabs to come and become citizens in Israel, Israel, as a democracy, will fall into the hands of the new majority, compromised of Arabs. Israel will lose its "Jewish character". Therefore, if Israel were to accept the "right of return", the outcome of such a peace agreement would be one Palestinian State in the West Bank and Gaza and another democracy called Israel, ruled by a majority of Arabs. Thus, Israel maintains, the Jewish State would be forever and altogether destroyed. There is not a single Israeli Jew who accepts such an outcome.
The second factual issue of note is that during the 1990s, Israel absorbed millions of immigrants from the former Soviet Union. Under Israel's flawed Law of Return, any person who has at least one Jewish grandparent has an automatic right to live in Israel. Judaic law maintains that a person is a Jew only if that person's mother is Jewish. As a result, a large percentage of those who immigrated to Israel from the former Soviet Union are not Jewish according to Jewish law.
In the Haaretz interview, Arafat was asked, "What about a solution that can allay Israeli concerns about a flood of refugees?"
His response was on the mark:
"Look, look, I discussed this matter clearly and obviously in Camp David with President Clinton and with Barak. [After a long aside about student days in Cairo, Arafat referred to a purported clipping, from Haaretz, that he carries with him. - BBH] It is still in my pocket, I will give it to you to see it: 62 percent of those who came [to Israel] from the Soviet Union, are not Jews; 90 percent of these are Christians and 10 percent are Muslims. And I told Clinton, okay, if they are accepting those 62 percent - they have become 70 percent by now - why not to give the chance for our people?"
Arafat then added, "Why the Muslim from Russia has a right to return and the Muslim from Palestine has not the right to return? And why the Christian from Russia has the right to come and the Palestinian Christian has not the right to come?"
In essence, Arafat was stumbling across a much more important issue. Israel and Israelis will jump up and down, kick and scream, be stubborn and insist that Israel must maintain its "Jewish character". Arafat asks, "What Jewish character?" What makes Israel a Jewish State? The fact that many Jews live in Israel does not make Israel a Jewish State any more than New York is a Jewish State with its two-three million Jewish inhabitants.
On June 14, 2004, the Israeli Supreme Court decided that Israeli municipalities must permit the sale of pork where a majority of residents demand it. Under current Israeli law, it is up to municipalities to decide whether to permit the sale of pork. Several towns have tried to limit the sale of pork or have banned it altogether. The nine-judge panel annulled existing local laws and said new regulations must be devised to reflect the true wishes of residents. Pork sales must be allowed in neighborhoods where a majority of residents want to buy it, the judges said. In areas where pork-buying residents are a minority, they must be able to have easy access to neighborhoods where it is sold; and in areas where the makeup of the neighborhood is not clear, the city must determine the opinion of the residents, the judges ruled.
As Michael Freund wrote in the Jerusalem Post, the judges completely missed the point. The ban on the sale of pork was not instituted to alleviate the sensitivities of observant Jews. It is wrong to prohibit one person's freedom because of another person's sensibilities. The issue here is not the rights of individuals. The ban was there to maintain the "Jewish character" of the State of Israel. A Jewish state should have a law on its books forbidding the sale of food that epitomizes Jewish dietary restrictions. Every person in the free world knows that pork is not "Jewish". Yet, nine members of the Israeli Supreme Court seemed to ignore it.
Like Israel's Law of Return, this decision is another attempt by the Supreme Court to redefine "Jewish character." The Jewish nation is thousands of years old and no matter what country or continent our tribulations have taken us, we, for the most part, remained unchanged. For thousands of years, we all knew what Jewish meant. Now, comes the Supreme Court and discards all that is Jewish and recreates an entire religion.
Israel must decide now whether Arafat is right or wrong. Israel must decide whether the State will have a Jewish character or not. If Israel chooses to abandon its Jewish identity, then what is the point of it? If Israel chooses to abandon its Jewish character, then Arafat is right - Israel ought to allow the Arab refugees in Lebanon to come and rule.