Vol. 73/No. 7      February 23, 2009

Yisrael Beiteinu, which overtook the Labor Party to win third place in the February 10 election to the Israeli parliament, openly calls for separating some majority-Arab areas inside Israel, including parts of Jerusalem, and handing them over to the Palestinian Authority. In exchange it wants to annex Jewish settlements on the West Bank to the state of Israel.

The party also backs passing a law that would require citizens to sign a loyalty oath pledging to defend the Jewish character of Israel and to serve in the Israeli army, or lose their citizenship rights, a measure aimed at Israeli Arabs.

Avigdor Lieberman, the party’s main leader, is an immigrant from Moldova in the former Soviet Union and a former nightclub bouncer. “The threat from within is more dangerous than the threat from outside,” Lieberman said recently.

Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, who’s Kadima Party came in first in the elections, echoed the rightist proposal. She argues it would be best to have a Palestinian state so that Israel’s Arab citizens could be told “your national aspirations lie elsewhere.”

A February 7 article in Haaretz, a daily in Israel, noted support for Lieberman’s party among high school students. “Israeli Arabs don’t support the state and yet they receive money and a seat in the Knesset [the Israeli parliament],” said high school student Nicole Parnasa. “Anyone who’s against the operation in Gaza, for example—that’s a kind of disloyalty.”

In an opinion piece from Yedioth Ahronoth, published in Israel, B. Michael said that Lieberman supporters “are certain that if only they demand that the Arabs pledge allegiance to the State and join the army, the Arabs will blatantly refuse, thereby enabling us to kick them out of here.”

According to Michael, in 1954 the state of Israel ordered the army enlistment of “minority groups.” Several thousand Palestinian youth “quickly and joyfully reported to the army’s induction offices,” he said. Panicked Israeli officials rapidly annulled the order.

Michel titled his piece “Be careful what you wish for.”
 
 
Related articles:
The fight for democracy and secularism in Israel  
 
 
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