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Israeli Bill Would Impose Loyalty Oath on Arab Citizens
JERUSALEM - An ultranationalist Israeli party headed by the country's foreign minister said today it plans to introduce a bill making Israeli citizenship contingent on an oath of allegiance, a move targeting the country's Arab minority.
Israeli foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman is pictured during a meeting in Tel Aviv. (May 21, 2009) Photo: Toronto Star The bill follows a separate proposal Sunday by the same party that would make it illegal for Arabs to mourn the "catastrophe" - the term Palestinians use to describe the exile caused by Israel's founding.
Both proposals by Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman's Yisrael Beitenu party focus on the perceived disloyalty of the country's Arab citizens, who form roughly one-fifth of the population. The legislation, which must still pass several hurdles to win final approval, drew harsh criticism from opposition legislators and civil rights groups.
Yisrael Beitenu swept to third place in recent parliamentary elections with a message that suggested Israel's Arabs were an internal threat to the country. It is a senior partner in the coalition government. The loyalty oath was one of its main campaign pledges.
The new legislation would make citizenship contingent on an oath of loyalty to Israel as a "Jewish, Zionist and democratic state," party spokesman Tal Nahum said.
The bill would also allow the government to revoke the citizenship of anyone who does not comply or perform some form of military or national service.
Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has yet to express a position on the matter.
The party's announcement came a day after it introduced a bill that would outlaw Arab demonstrations mourning their defeat and exile in the war that surrounded Israel's establishment in 1948. The bill received preliminary approval from a ministerial forum but still needs to pass repeated readings in parliament before becoming law.
The bill threatens three years in prison to anyone who participates in public protests or commemorations.
"I think we can reach a situation in which citizens of our country will not mark a day of mourning for the establishment of the country they live in," the lawmaker who sponsored the bill, Alex Miller, told Army Radio.
The bills appear not have the support necessary to win parliamentary approval. Nonetheless, they drew furious reactions from Arab parties and civil rights groups.
Arab lawmaker Hana Swaid called Miller's bill "racist," saying it "eliminates the right of Palestinian Arab citizens to pronounce their identity and national feelings."
Although Israel's Arabs, unlike Palestinians in the neighbouring West Bank and Gaza Strip, hold full citizenship rights, they suffer from discrimination and have little identification with a country that defines itself as Jewish.
Mohammed Darawshe of the Abraham Fund Initiatives, which works for coexistence between Jews and Arabs in Israel, said the bills reflect "an ideology imported from dark regimes that have collapsed."
Also today, Israeli aircraft scattered pamphlets over the Gaza Strip warning residents to stay away from the border.
The Arabic pamphlets warned Gazans to stay out of areas 300 metres to 500 metres from the border fence, saying they risk being shot. The military has scattered similar warning pamphlets in the past.
43 Comments so far
Show AllThis makes me so sick. It seems there is no line Israel can cross that's severe enough to draw criticism from the US government. The deranged supporters of the Yisrael Beitenu supporters have no conscience.
You do not truly think that the USA who illegally occupies more than 60% of its own geographical territory, would support a Palestinian state.
Only the Americans could be more hypocritical than the Israelis----how valid is a 'forced oath' anyway----the Israelis have not complied with international laws of engagement---after lamenting their own "holocaust" at the hands of another savage people who honored nothing either-----
The insanity just goes on forever with little or not end in sight.
The only consolation the Palestinians may have is that sooner or later the USA will fall apart, then Israel will loose its only true Alli and its largest supporter---then, the Israelis will need to evacuate---or perish at the hand of a justifiably angry people. It is simply a matter of time.
Good Luck America/Israel you both are living on borrowed time.
You are preaching to the choir.
"Mohammed Darawshe of the Abraham Fund Initiatives, which works for coexistence between Jews and Arabs in Israel, said the bills reflect 'an ideology imported from dark regimes that have collapsed.'"
The zionists seem determined to visit every abuse on the Palestinians that has been used against Jews throughout history.
The efforts described in this article mirror the enforced conversions of Jews in Spain hundreds of years ago. Their efforts to exterminate the Palestinians look too much like Hitler's Final Solution.
q
Well this will certainly separate the ashkeNAZI from the rest of the population. I suspect that it is not entirely by accident that Adolph Hitler and his brownshirt thugs chose the acronym NAZI for their party name, they were merely flattering their chief financial supporters.
Any chance the stoopid USAers will come to their senses when they see Michael Chertoff, Ricard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, Larry Franklin, Douglas Feith, Edward Luttwak, Henry Kissinger, Dov Zakheim, Kenneth Adelman, “Scooter” Libby, Robert Satloff, Elliott Abrams, Marc Grossman, Richard Haass, Robert Zoellick, Ari Fleischer, James Schlesinger, David Frum, Joshua Bolten, John Bolton, David Wurmser, Eliot Cohen, Mel Sembler, Steve Goldsmith, Adam Goldman, Joseph Gildenhorn, Christopher Gersten, Mark Weinberger, Samuel Bodman, Bonnie Cohen, Ruth Davis, Daniel Kurtzer, Cliff Sobel, Stuart Bernstein, Nancy Brinker, Frank Lavin, Ron Weiser, Mel Sembler, Marting Silverstein, Lincoln Bloomfield, Jay Lefkowitz, Ken Melman, and Brad Blakeman take ther oath of allegiance to the zionist/nazi cause?
zionists are the scourge of the Jews!
Sophie Scholl-The Final Days
White Rose - you forgot Rhom Emmanuel, too. He is also a dual citizen.
We need to work to overthrow UN Resolution 181. It is ridiculous to have displaced so many people so a few Jews from the Holocaust can settle in their lands. Ever since the Zionists came to Palestine, they have been trying to commit genocide on a large scale. They certainly seemed to have learned well from the NAZIs.
Actually, Rahm Emanuel gave up his Israeli citizenship before he ran for office. Of course, as a Jew, he can get it back any time by landing on Israeli soil.
Rainborowe
Of course, there's no real way to know that.
Presumably true, but his loyalties...??
Will they make the arabs wear red crescents on their shirts too?
It seems to me having a jews only state in the middle of the mid-east makes about as much sense as a whites only country in the middle of Africa.
What will it take to end all aid to israel? Voting doesn't seem to work, writing letters and having marches does nothing.
It looks like sedition and sabotage are the only recourse.
Such suggested racial policies smack of South Africa before the ANC prevailed. We should stop sending Israel aid until democracy arrives. A two state solution is a must. BOTH Israel and Palestine deserve to live in peace side by side.
Such suggested racial policies smack of South Africa before the ANC prevailed. We should stop sending Israel aid until democracy arrives. A two state solution is a must. BOTH Israel and Palestine deserve to live in peace side by side.
The bill threatens three years in prison to anyone who participates in public protests or commemorations (of the Nakba...)
The new legislation would make citizenship contingent on an oath of loyalty to Israel as a "Jewish, Zionist and democratic state," party spokesman Tal Nahum said...
Some "Democracy". Oh, that's right - they embrace multiantional corporate capitalism - so that means they are a democracy.
I'm sure that the resident Hasbarists will show up by and by to put their usual spin on this latest atrocity.
Israel's prolific production of legal AND military atrocities is invariably spun by compulsive defenders as either "not as bad as the uninformed and biased would have it", or "a regrettable necessity in response to even more deplorable conduct by the Enemy".
I'll make the popcorn while we're waiting.
· Yr Obd't Servant
you summed it up nicely OS,
Pretty scary stuff; this seems like the first step to purge Palestinians who are Israeli citizens (referred to as "Arabs" in the article). Since Lieberman has called for the extermination of the Palestinian people as a whole, I fear this is only the beginning of the plan
It's certainly reminiscent of making the Jews of Germany and occupied Europe wear the yellow star, isn't it?
Rainborowe
Sure enough Americans can swear pledge of allegiance aka the loyalty oath every day in school or anytime such shmuck as bush or Obama appear in public. But not in Israel! Shameless CD posters will cry Nazi.
But Americans do not have to recite the pledge, and many of them don't. I actually don't know it; I've only once been in a situation in which it was recited. I just stood.
Rainborowe
Rainborowe, you raise an interesting point about the pledge:
"I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands: one Nation under God, indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all."
Since I teach HS part-time and often say the pledge, I've given it more thought than I used to, in terms of actually reflecting what I would pledge to and what I believe that America should stand for.
I've taken to pledging, "and to the democratic Republic for which it stands", when I say it myself.
But even that qualifier does not seem sufficient in these times when our country is clearly being taken from us (average citizens) by the global ruling-elite 'corporate financial Empire' which now so clearly controls our country by hiding behind the facade of its two-party 'Vichy' sham of democracy (aided by the equally 'Vichy' corporatist media).
And so I will start saying the pledge in school with these words which I could certainly justify and better use in teaching American history also --- "and to the democratic (anti-Empire) Republic for which it stands".
I'm sure that Howard Zinn would document and agree with this more accurate representation, since the original American Revolution and actual Boston 'Tea Party' (opposed to the propagandist crap tha recently occurred at FOX's prodding) were very precisely against the multi-faceted British Empire, which oppressed our forefathers with combined political AND economic tyranny, as well as the social and military oppressions that spread from the political-economic core of the Empire's cancerous tumor and metastasized into, and sought to control, all aspects and spheres of the colonists' lives.
Yes, Rainborowe, you've given me encouragement and a great idea. Now all we need is another Washington, Franklin, Jefferson, FDR, JFK, or Eisenhower, who actually realized that EMPIRE was the greatest threat to their democratic Republic, and had the guts to 'tell the people' to guard against the undue power of concentrated economic power and 'financial royalists' who should, along with their privatized corporate power, have been banned and sent to the same off-shore haunts that the original loyalist and royalists were sent to in Revolutionary days.
Who knows, having fought the Nazi Empire, which had taken over the German Republic, invaded and occupied the French Republic, and installed a phony 'Vichy' facade of government to rule France, Eisenhower would probably have liked and approved of the idea of adding "and to the democratic (anti-Empire) Republic" to the pledge today.
In fact old Ike might even say, "let's make it 'democratic (anti-Empire, and anti-military-industrial-complex) Republic for which it stands' and remember all the tricks of those bastards".
Alan MacDonald
Sanford, Maine
Actually it was during Ike's administration that the controversial "Under God" was added.
And here's some irony, the Pledge was originally written by a Socialist, Francis Bellamy.
My favorite quote regarding the Pledge is (though I can't remember who said it);
"We must make saying the Pledge of Allegiance mandatory to remind people of our liberties".
That's why they don't teach philosophy or critical thinking in public schools; can't have kids learning what hypocrisy is.
Alan--
My greatest objection to it is that it is a pledge to a flag--a piece of rag. I have no trouble with the rest, except for the "under God" nonsense which I consider unconstitutional.
I actually have nothing against flags; they're symbols but only symbols. When we raise the symbol to the status of a god, as Americans routinely and usually quite inappropriately do (as in response to the horrific deaths by murder of 3,000 people), I find that sickening.
Rainborowe
Suggestion:
"I pledge allegiance to the flag of the corporate kleptocracy of America, and to the Empire for which it stands, one oligopoly under the Almighty Dollar, with low wages and junk food for all.
CD posters are shameless? Astounding. You Zionists will say anything no matter how hateful and hope it sticks.
v.purto, while American school children do often voluntarily say the pledge of allegiance, there was a funny and telling situation in one of Michael Moore's films where he tried to get supposedly patriotic CEO's of American corporations to say the pledge with him.
None he interviewed would say the pledge on camera, because, they said, it might effect their global business interests.
Of course, the renowned corporate captain, Jack Welch (former CEO of GE, a nominally American corporation) infamously said, "the ideal factory would be on a barge, that I could have towed to the lowest wage country" --- some patriot!
And this summarizes a great point --- that the well disguised global ruling-elite 'corporate financial Empire' and its leading 'empire-thinking' CEO's, Hedge Fund Whores, and Private Equity Pirates, still love to pretend to be patriotic citizens of their 'home turf' counties (like the U.S., U.K., Israel or China) but the truth is that this crowd has no, zero, zilch patriotism or even interest in any national nation-state-centric model of their world. Instead they are true 'citizens of the world', globalists, ruling-classists, or rapacious plunderers (whichever phrase you like) --- since these 'empire thinking' global, detached, and ethereal ruling-elite 'master of the universe' can not stand to be tethered to so parochial a thought as having a allegiance to anything so passe as a country. No, their interests in countries (as we still think of them) is merely how much natural resources they can extract and expropriate from what they think of as not a country, but a territory. Or, in the special case of the USA, they think in terms of how they can use and abuse the military super-power weapons (and working-class young troops) of the U.S. to better oppress and tyrannize the rest of the old fashioned and out-dated 'countries' of the world for their vainglorious privatization of global wealth into their own elitist pockets!
Alan MacDonald
Sanford, Maine
You're comparing apples and oranges. The pledge recited by kids at school is meaningless, there are no consequences for mouthing the words, or not taking the pledge at all. Swearing such a pledge when serving in government or at court or joining the military has more consequences for breaking the oath, or not being willing to swear such a thing. What the Israeli bill proposes is that you swear, or you lose any and all rights, that's a heck of a consequence. It's not like their in the army, or serving on a jury, nor are they elected to the parliament. There's no reason for any country to jail or strip the citizenship rights because you don't swear loyalty to that country.
That Lieberman - what a freakin' Nazi!
Say, that's an idea! How about a Loyalty Oath for our own elected officials? I
believe most of them are running afoul of the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA).
Oh, I see. They have already Pledged their Allegiance - - - to Israel, Greed and Zionism.
So sad... Another case of an abused child who grew up to become an abuser...
Let's have all those dual American-israeli citizens take that loyalty pledge...
This anti-Arab legislation is legal cover for the planned pogrom against Arabs to come...
As always:
Patriotism is the last refuge of scoundrels.
It's amazing how time and time again, Zionism is shown up to be what it really is. And yet you have the Z-trolls constantly bringing up their discredited points of view and their lies and their distortions as if they were the truth.
You must understand that serving in the IDF is compulsory, and many IDF desk jockeys are employed or volunteer to fight a psychological operations war for public opinion... There are hundreds of them who are ordered to troll websites and spout specific talking points to bring up redherrings, strawmen, and use ad hominem attacks to turn a matter of violating international law into a matter of opinion...
The US military also employs folks to carry out psy-ops in cyberspace to win the "hearts & minds" of folks at home and abroad...
RadioFreeEurope and NPR have long been mouthpieces of imperialism and controlled by the CIA... This is their attempt to maintain ideological hegemony over the american psyche...
Then you have your Zionist apologists who are ignorant of the facts on the ground, or have feelings of exceptionalism for their country or race or religion... And need a "casus belli" to justify to their own conscience how to explain away the war crimes committed by the current regime occupying Palestine...
Interesting. Thank you.
I guess the US government took this oath years ago.
Best comment on the thread (laughing).
I think there is a silver lining to the cloud. Those who have always argued that Israel, and by definition, Zionism are inherently racist will now have their work cut out for them. All they need to do is quote the Leiberman fellow.
well, this probably won't fly this go round, but it's inevitable that israeli policy comes to this.
i need some money, so who wants to make a wager on how long it takes the NYTimes, WaPo, Time, etc., to report on this? my answer is d) none of the above, aka never
and don't our elected officials, national ones anyway, and military already take a "loyalty oath" to uphold and defend the constitution? hopefully, when the time comes, the israeli citizenry, palestinian & jew alike, will be as faithful to that oath as US politicos are to their oath....
okay
JERUSALEM – Yehoshua Zettler, one of the founding members of a violent pre-state Jewish movement and mastermind of the assassination of a top U.N. envoy in 1948, has died in Israel. He was 91.
He was most renowned for planning the assassination of United Nations mediator Count Folke Bernadotte in Jerusalem in September 1948.
As head of the Swedish Red Cross during World War II, Bernadotte negotiated with top Nazi Heinrich Himmler to save thousands of Jews from concentration camps.
LEHI commanders considered Bernadotte to be a British agent who cooperated with the Nazis. They picked Zettler to have him killed. A LEHI team blocked his limousine, and a gunman killed Bernadotte and a French officer in the car.
"This country owes him (Zettler) a great debt that Jerusalem is today in our hands," said ultranationalist lawmaker Arieh Eldad.
http://asia.news.yahoo.com/ap/20090526/twl-ml-israel-obit-zettler-38359fb.html
...Then Zettler joined in a massacre at the village of Deir Yassin, just outside Jerusalem. This atrocity, in which over 100 unarmed Arabs were murdered by members of Zettler’s Stern Gang and the Irgun Gang, led by Menachem Begin (who later became prime minister of Israel), has never received the condemnation that would have applied if Arabs had gone on a similar killing binge.
One Israeli witness stated that “[The attackers chose] to kill anybody they found alive as though every living thing in the village was the enemy and they could only think ‘kill them all.’ . . . It was a lovely spring day, the almond trees were in bloom, the flowers were out and everywhere there was the stench of the dead, the thick smell of blood, and the terrible odour of the corpses burning in the quarry.” And one of the killers, Ben Zion-Cohen of the Irgun gang, said simply that “We eliminated every Arab that came our way.”
This is called ‘freedom fighting’ when practised by Israel....
The vileness of Zettler’s massacre in Deir Yassin is only too similar to the acts of terror committed during Israel’s invasion and destruction of Gaza five months ago....
As an expansion of this activity in Israel, do you think there is any merit in ensuring that all people of Jewish extraction living in the US are also forced to sign a loyalty clause to remain in the US regardless of how many passports they currently have? Neocons included and members of the President's Foreign Policy advising team and the Vice President as well. Let's get them all at one time. A large mass loyalty function.
Might be a surprise if the penalty for not doing so means being removed and forced to live in Israel. What a dilemma that could cause with another penalty for spying for Israel is being confined to prison for life.
Had this been done years ago, the Middle East question could have resolved thirty years ago.
Sadly, if the big time Israeli lobbyists were forced to live in Israel, the disposable incomes of Senators and Congress members might diminish so much they could be in real difficulty and may be forced to vote in a fair and honest manner on the Palestine question. Now that would be refreshing, but unlikely.
The fact is that Netanyahu is a power-hungry S.O.B. who essentially doesn't give a damn about Israel or its future and that is why he is pursuing such psychotic policies, not to mention, partnering with that disgusting thug and excuse for a human being, Avigdor Lieberman. "Bibi" is an exceptionaly talented actor and speaker, not so disimilar to our current Liar-in-Chief, Mr. Obama.
It is exceedingly depressing for me as a Sephardic jew and as someone who does business in the middle east with both Israel and Arab countries to witness such trash at the head of Israel's executive body. There will never ever be peace in Israel until Israelis grow the hell up already and elect someone who will SINCERELY negotiate for them with the Arabs. Unfortunately, the current Israeli administration has setback the peace process at least thirty years in my estimation. If Obama has any spine, he will follow Bush senior's tough position on Israel, or even better, Jimmy Carter's.
The ticking time bomb that remains though is if Israel or the US or both are stupid enough to start a conflict with Iran.....well, mark my words, that will be the end of society as we know it for most people on earth. It is for these reasons, and others not mentioned here, I have been for almost 20 years a militant agnostic. For if there really were a God somewhere up there in the skies, he would immediately put a bullet in every cabinet member's head of the current Bibi administration, and delegate Zipni Livni, or Haifa mayor, Amram Mitzna, as the permanent Israeli prime minister. Too bad for us His Holiness is nowhere to be found......
Israel, modern day Fascism from the people it hurt the most.