Jewish state bill debate not ideological

Elections are underway and it will not be long before we hear MKs from different parties fervidly explaining how they torpedoed the bill that sought to cement Israel's nature as the Jewish nation state; how they saved Israel from racism, discrimination, and the radical Right.

But have they? Those who believe MKs, from the opposition and coalition alike, who contested the Jewish state bill were waging an ideological battle are sorely mistaken.

What happened to the Labor MKs who in 2010, when I was an MK, backed a similar bill I had presented, but have now chosen to oppose it? They were not guided by ideology, that much is certain.

Israel is a Jewish and democratic state -- that was the fundamental creed upon which I based my proposal for Basic Law: Israel's Identity, which came to be known as the "Jewish state bill." Israel as a Jewish and democratic state -- in that order.

It has been four years. This opinion piece was written on November 29 -- the historical date when the U.N. recognized our right to a Jewish state in the land of Israel.

It was the late Prime Minister Menachem Begin who said Israel was won not by force, but by the force of our right to it. I subscribe to that saying wholeheartedly, as a citizen of Israel -- the nation state of the Jewish people.

It is for that very right that we have fought since Israel's inception, against enemy armies and terrorist organizations, near our borders and far away from them, and I was taken aback when I learned that of all things, a Basic Law that cements our right to determine Israel's identity as the nation-state of the Jewish people, was missing from our codex.

The Declaration of Independence is the document establishing the fundamentals of the Jewish state, which is why I am stunned, time and again, by the political firestorm and the opposition the Jewish state bill has evoked. This was not the case four years ago, when I drafted the bill with the help of my friends at the Institute for Zionist Strategy.

Garnering support for the bill was easier than I had anticipated. Unlike the uproar today, at the time many MKs sought to co-sponsor the legislation proposal, and I had to go to great lengths to convince some of them to go on the record as mere signatories rather than co-sponsors, as they preferred.

Support for the bill came from across the political spectrum, from Labor, Kadima, the Likud, Yisrael Beytenu and the National Religious Party (today Habayit Hayehudi). Soon after, however, Labor held its primaries, and several of its MKs asked to be removed as signatories, so not to lose their Arab supporters' votes.

The proposal for Basic Law: Israel's identity resonated among the coalition and the opposition alike. Given that MKs who serve as ministers and deputy ministers are prevented from backing private legislation proposals, getting 40 MKs to co-sign my bill was a feat, as it meant nearly half of the MKs who were allowed to support the bill had done so.

If we offset the number of Arab MKs, as well as the ultra-Orthodox parties, which notoriously opposed any Basic Law -- "Even if you presented the Ten Commandments as a Basic Law we would oppose it," a senior haredi MK once said -- then the number of signatories was unprecedented.

In 2010, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reviewed my bill, acknowledged its importance and pledged to promote it. Yes, I was still a member of the opposition at the time, a member of Kadima, not the Likud.

Those opposing the bill cited the status of the Arabic language as their main reason. In a revised version of the bill, I made sure to circumvent the issue, saying, "Hebrew shall be Israel's official language. The Arabic language will be granted special status, guaranteeing those who speak Arabic full language access to all state services, as determined by the law."

I am pleased to say that I speak fluent Arabic. I first learned it for my job in the Shin Bet security agency, but as time went by I understood who helpful it was when it came to communicating with friends and foes alike. There is an Arabic proverb that states, "Your language is the horse on which you ride. If you treat it well, it will always serve you faithfully, but if you do not, it will turn on you when you need it the most."

Nevertheless, Israel is not a bilingual state. It never was. The Arab education system, which includes about a quarter of the students in Israel, is obligated to teach Hebrew, but the same cannot be said for the Hebrew education system, where students only learn Arabic if they choose to do so -- choose, as part of a special language track.

Not making Arabic as a second language a compulsory subject in schools is a grave mistake by the education system. I believe it is critical to promoting Jewish-Arab relations.

Those opposing my bill also explained their opposition by saying that its original version devoted the first paragraph to Israel as a Jewish state, leaving its democratic nature to the second paragraph.

The order, they said, suggested that Israel's democratic nature was somehow subjected to its Jewish character. Top legalists debunked that assumption, but I still revised the bill, adopting and adapting the language of Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty, to say, "The purpose of this Basic Law is to protect Israel's nature as the nation-state of the Jewish people [originally " to protect human dignity and liberty"] in order to establish in a Basic Law tile values of the State of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state." I added: "In the spirit of the Declaration of Independence."

To those who suggested I adapt the Declaration of Independence into a Basic Law, thus making the Jewish state bill more palatable, I reminded them that the Declaration of Independence mentions only a "Jewish state," and while it makes reference to Israel's democratic nature, it does not include the words "democratic state" per se.

I can only hope that the next government promotes the Jewish state bill, and that we all remember Begin's words -- not by force, but by the force of our right to it.

טעינו? נתקן! אם מצאתם טעות בכתבה, נשמח שתשתפו אותנו