Knesset pushes two more legislative pieces that would drive Israel further from democracy

Last week, the Ministerial Legislative Committee – which is responsible for deciding whether a bill will receive government sponsorship, which will allow it to be speedily debated and almost assure its becoming a law – debated a bill, tabled by MK Uri Ariel (Ha’Ichud Ha’Leumi). The Committee decided to delay its decision regarding the bill, named “Bill for Defending the Values of the State of Israel” until next month.

The bill – an Hebrew version of it can be read here (document) – is worrisome, as its purpose is to limit the already limited range of expression of opinions opposing the dominant Zionist dogma. Israeli law already allows the disqualification of a party from participation in the elections, if that party calls for undermining Israel’s Jewish and democratic nature. Ariel’s bill takes that approach one step further: it orders the Register of Societies and the Register of Companies to prevent the registration of societies or companies who subvert the “Jewish nature” of the State of Israel, and allows them to order the dissolution of such associations. The example Ariel suggests for an association which should be dissolved is one “whose express purpose is the conversion of Jews to another religion”.

In short, Ariel wants to prevent people who disagree with Jewish dogma – Jewish Orthodox dogma, it should be emphasized – from expressing their views. His bill will prevent them from creating associations, so that any serious attempt to express their views – holding large rallies or meetings, publishing a newspaper, anything that requires expenditure of funds – will put them in serious problems with the law, and will severely curtail their ability to raise contributions. Ariel’s bill is very close to outlawing dissent outright. All this, of course, is done under the mantle of “Jewish and democratic”; Ariel has no compunction saying the first should overrule the second, noting that in every law “Jewish” comes before “democratic” and quoting for that purpose the late Justice Menahem Alon, as well as Prof. Ruth Gabizon at her most strident.

It should be emphasized that the bill is, by nature, retroactive: it is intended to prevent not just the registration of new associations, but also to bring the dissolution of existing ones.

ACRI, which sent a sharp letter regarding the bill to Justice Minister Yaakov Ne’eman, termed the bill as an attempt at political persecution by one side of another. Among the societies who may be hit by the law, it cautioned, are “The Reform movement, the Conservative movement, and other movements of Jewish pluralism; any organization supporting, in any way, full civil equality to minorities in Israel, even under a democratic regime; any organization supporting refugee rights, or work emigrants’ rights, or Palestinian rights (regarding their status in Israel); companies or societies supporting or carrying out activities on Shabbat; societies who support people who left religious life (hozrim b’sheela) or women trying to have an abortion; societies working for freedom from religion or for women’s rights in rabbinical courts, or for women’s prayer at the Western Wall with talis; human rights organizations who act for Palestinians’ rights in Israel, the West Bank or Gaza; organizations trying to carry out educational activity which engages in dialogue with ‘the other’, trying to understand its history and point of view; and many more. According to some world-views, the aforementioned companies and/or societies, all of them or some of them, have no right to exist”.

The idea that Ministerial Legislative Committee would seriously debate such a bill was laughable just two years ago; not any more. The Israeli media has given the bill absolutely no coverage.

While he was yet speaking, there came also another: MK Liya Shemtov tabled two more loyalty bills (Hebrew) in the never-ending series of its party, Yisrael Beitenu. The new bills will demands that all state employees, as well as all local council members, to swear loyalty to “The State of Israel, a Jewish and democratic State”. I think we can, after the last few months, dispense with the pretense that that suffix, “vedemocratit”, means anything more than purifying the unclean, from serving as a fig leaf to hide an abomination behind. So far, state employees and local council members swore allegiance to “the State of Israel and its laws”, which worked rather well. Now Shemtov wants to purify the civil service of non-Jews, therefore she burdens them with oaths which they cannot swear in clear conscience. Now she wants to prevent Israeli Arabs towns and villages, discriminated against as they are, also of the ability to run their own business by their own elected officials. She says so explicitly: “Anyone who wants to enjoy the benefits of what the state has to offer, let him swear allegiance to it, even if he is a member of the Umm Al Fahm town council”.

How do you explain to her – and most Israeli Jews – that “the right to enjoy the benefits of the state” is independent of a loyalty oath, that it is a basic right, derived from being a citizen? How do you explain to them they’ve got it wrong, that it is the state which owes loyalty to its citizens, not vice versa? How do you explain to them that the state is but a tool for the service of the citizens, that whenever it assumes more than that it is transformed into a monster, a Moloch demanding sacrifice? How to explain to them that such bills do not increase loyalty, but decrease it?

For, after all, Shemtov and her followers are not interested in loyalty; it is submission they seek. They wish for a state where the Jews can, finally, reach their correct place in the Orthodox cosmos and become a master-nation, where they can finally feel what it means to live in a country where you’re the one holding the whip.