Yeah, I'd say that the line between democracy and not-a-democracy is crossed when you start banning political parties.
I'm sure Germany will be saddened to hear that.
I don't think that's the line but it is sure as fuck an indicator that the line may have been crossed. I think the Germany thing is defensible.....this current one, not so much.
Yeah, I'd say that the line between democracy and not-a-democracy is crossed when you start banning political parties.
I'm sure Germany will be saddened to hear that.
I don't think that's the line but it is sure as fuck an indicator that the line may have been crossed. I think the Germany thing is defensible.....this current one, not so much.
I can't wait until these two ultranationalist parties bring a motion forcing all arabs to wear crescent armbands. It'll be like 1933 all over again!
I don't understand. Isn't this a country that is entirely defined by being Jewish? Obviously they don't want their Jewish homeland to become a Muslim country simply because more Muslims live there than Jews. I understand that looking at it from a purely neutral point of view it is racist for them to ban a certain religion from government, but shit, you have to be protestant (or at least not catholic, not sure which) to be King or Queen of the UK and no one seems to complain about that because this is a country that has been pretty much defined by the fact it is Protestant.
Unless I am mistaken the King or Queen is also the head of the Anglican church? That would be akin to suggesting the Pope shouldn't be Roman Catholic.
Yeah, at one time the British royal family answered to Rome and it was expected of any monarch to be Catholic or become Catholic (everybody in Europe basically was at that time anyway). Then Henry VIII ditched the Pope and created the Anglican Church so he could get a divorce and since then the King or Queen of Britain has been the Supreme Governor of the Church of England. Effectively the Church of England is 'sort of' Catholic but also Reformed. But you don't have to be Anglican to be King or Queen, you need to be an immediate descendant of the previous Monarch. And then I guess you become head of the church of England by default anyway.
Which is all very much by the by because the British royal family doesn't functionally rule the country any more anyway. Also, we're talking about a monarchy versus an elected government here. Political parties in the UK are not required to be affiliated with the Anglican or any other church. Certainly appearing to be affiliated with a popular religion helps win you votes (rumours abound of Blair switching denominations in order to gain popularity amongst certain demographics) but it is not strictly necessary. They are expected to be elected representatives of the people, not of God. The populace of Israel is not 100% Jewish, there are plenty of Christians and Muslims and no doubt other denominations and atheists who are Israeli citizens and if Israel wishes to consider itself a democracy they can't exclude non-Jewish citizens from having representation in government.
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Yeah, but BBC is UK. And actually an respectable news organization.
Don't see anything on Finnish news yet, although there is an article that says that Israel is using experimental weapons in Gaza. Dense Inert Metal Explosives or something.
Just a note, when talking about Hamas: I know it kind of isn't a big deal, but calling them anti-Semitic means they don't like Arabs either, because Arabs are Semites. I saw a few posts saying "Hamas are anti-Semitic" and I just wanted to say that little fact real quick :X
Yes. We've gone over it before that "Anti-Semite" is nigh-meaningless here.
This is the most pedantic, useless bloviating and it always gets brought up.
If 95% of people mean anti-Jewish when they say anti-Semetic, stop typing useless shit to look smart and just accept it.
The 30-member panel voted 26-3 with one abstention to disqualify Balad, and voted 21-3 with eight abstentions to disqualify UAL-Ta'al.
The committee is composed of representatives from Israel's major political parties.
The measure was proposed by the National Union and Israel Beiteinu, two ultra-nationalist parties.
National Union:
The party has a joint platform, and in particular it supports the settlement of all the Land of Israel, advocates the use of more military power in the War on terror and harsher measures against Palestinian terrorism. It rejects all current Oslo-based peace efforts — which it sees as dangerous to Israel — and the notion of what it calls a "22nd Arab state". The party instead advocates voluntary transfer of the Arabs from the West Bank, though it has been vague as to how this could be implemented.
Despite the joint platform, the three constituents retain their unique identity on a rhetorical level:
* Ahi represents the National-Ultra-Orthodox (Hardal) faction of the Torah-religious public in Israel. They put focus on supporting the settlements, fighting terrorism and corruption and reestablishing the high-status of Torah Zionism.
* Moledet focuses on the notion of transfer and more generally national security issues. It prides itself on being composed equally of non-Orthodox and Orthodox elements, although its members are sympathetic to NRP views.
* Tkuma represents the Orthodox side. While not actively opposing the Israel Beytenu dominated platform, it uses Torah motives and argumentation to advance the union's common ground.
Essentially, the two key principles held by the movement are the creation of an encouraging socio-economic environment for new immigrants to Israel, while at the same time taking a hard line on all negotiations with the Palestinians and other Arab states. Part of the academic argument in the movement's platform is based on the numerous studies published by faculties in Israel that warn of a danger posed to the Jewish character of Israel by the rising percentage of Arabs in the population of the state. The only solution, argue many of their supporters, is an increased effort to bring more Jews to Israel by immigration, and/or to convince as many Arab citizens of Israel as possible to leave. By giving in to Yasser Arafat's demands, argued Lieberman, the government would aggravate the threat by strengthening the Palestinians' resolve to demand the Right of Return of Palestinians to Israeli territory.
Yisrael Beiteinu supports a two-state solution to the conflict. According to the party motto, "Israel is Our Home, Palestine is Theirs". In 2005, the party proposed the so-called Lieberman Plan, an alternative to Sharon's Disengagement plan, that would see large blocs of land in Israel bordering the West Bank populated by Arabs transferred to the Palestinian Authority in exchange for recognition of Israeli sovereignty in the larger settlements including Gush Katif settlement bloc in the Gaza Strip which was destroyed before the withdrawal.
The plan broke with a long tradition in the right-wing revisionist Israeli nationalist camp that saw transfer of minority populations between states as the only solution to deal with a perceived threat of disloyalty by Arab citizens of Israel to the idea of a Jewish state in the Middle East. It was the first proposal for the transfer of lands in Israel-proper to the Palestinian Authority in exchange for peace.
Yisrael Beiteinu promotes the idea that all Israeli citizens should swear loyalty to the country and its symbols. The party emphasizes that since the majority of Arab citizens of Israel do not serve in the Israeli army, and since many identify with the Palestinians, they are disloyal, and thus should not enjoy citizenship in Israel.
Yeah...
The motion claimed the two Arab parties supported terrorism and "did not recognise Israel's existence as a Jewish and democratic state", Knesset spokesman Giora Pordis told the AFP news agency.
I don't get this. How will banning them solve that problem other than radicalizing them further?
Yisrael Beiteinu promotes the idea that all Israeli citizens should swear loyalty to the country and its symbols. The party emphasizes that since the majority of Arab citizens of Israel do not serve in the Israeli army, and since many identify with the Palestinians, they are disloyal, and thus should not enjoy citizenship in Israel.
So, they basically want to make Israel an official theocracy?
First of all, I'm Israeli to any of you who didn't know.
Now, couple of things:
A. They do this EVERY BLOODY ELECTIONS. And every time the courts tell they can't do that, this won't hold till the elections (and yes, like always, the government will abide by this).
B. Most democratic countries has some form of party disqualification if they are not democratic (like, but not limited to supporting violence or terror, please see article 49 of the Italic Constitution or the Ley Organica de Partidos Politicos from Spain, or the Dutch Civil Code, Article 2 or the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Germany, Article 21(2) and I can go on).
C. The declared reason behind this move by the Knesset was that the Parties were supporting the armed struggle against Israel, i.e killing Israeli troopers. Not opposing the war itself but actively promoting it.
My opinion, and I apologize as I usually try to refrain from using harsh language in my posts:
This move is fucking bullshit, what the fuck were they thinking?! This obviously undemocratic, and I don't care how much of a 'roid rage you're on from the war, this kind of thing is simply unacceptable.
I mean, bloody hell, you can- not agree with them, you can hate them, you can curse them, yell at them, but YOU CAN'T TAKE AWAY THEIR RIGHT TO BE VOTED FOR, LESS THEN A MONTH BEFORE THE ELECTIONS.
If the ICJ (Israeli High Court of Justice) doesn't reverse this decision, I personally going to go and demonstrate.
Fucking hypocrites. This is what happens when you get baboons in the parliament, I'm just surprised they're not throwing feces at each other.
P.S
Please don't get the wrong impressions about Israelis in general from this. Alot of us do not agree with this move at all.
Eh, honestly, after hearing about this, I figured it was the politicians doing some bullshit to posture and retain power. I never really thought it represented the will of the people. I mean, god forbid I'm ever called in to account for all the shit the US government gets up to.
Unfortunately, it seems to me that Israeli civilians get held accountable by foreign countries for some of the shit their government does with alarming consistency.
Really? By whom? Whenever I bitch about Israel's actions, it's always about what the government is doing, and I haven't read anything in the two Israel threads that indicates people are blaming anyone but the government and the politicians.
Unfortunately, it seems to me that Israeli civilians get held accountable by foreign countries for some of the shit their government does with alarming consistency.
As someone who has gotten into a scuffle in a Belgian bar over a President I didn't vote for, this isn't an Israeli-only phenomenon.
Really? By whom? Whenever I bitch about Israel's actions, it's always about what the government is doing, and I haven't read anything in the two Israel threads that indicates people are blaming anyone but the government and the politicians.
Um...Hamas etc.?
I mean, it isn't just Israeli government officials who are dying in the rocket attacks from what I've heard. The IDF aren't the only people bombing civilians in this exchange etc. Nothing says "held accountable" like a rocket in your bagel.
Unfortunately, it seems to me that Israeli civilians get held accountable by foreign countries for some of the shit their government does with alarming consistency.
As someone who has gotten into a scuffle in a Belgian bar over a President I didn't vote for, this isn't an Israeli-only phenomenon.
As an American who travels abroad, I want to hear that story. I guess this isn't the place for it, so...
I'm kind of surprised that they do this on a yearly basis and the courts haven't gotten tired of it and established a penalty for continuing the practice as part of the declaration.
Didn't the US do that with some rather horrible voter suppression strategies? Specifically regarding autodialing your opponent's phone banks to render them inoperable?
for all the goals the 'yea' voters had in mind with this ban, would they have banned a Jewish party that presented the same obstacles?
By this, do you mean "would they have banned a Jewish party that opposed the war?"
I don't want to get too specific with the reasoning, because some of ya'll think the main thing was the war- some of ya'll think this is more a "I've been waiting a long time to set back the Arabs..." kind of thing in general, etc. Whatever you think the main motive was- the main "why we have to get 'dem 'dere Arab parties out da' way", if an all Jewish party presented the exact same 'conflict' with the ruling party's interests, would they have been banned as well?
Well aren't there some pretty liberal Jewish parties to?
From what I can gather, Meretz-Yachad are against the war. Hell, they want to give the Palestinians their own state, dismantle Israeli settlements in the Bank, and ensure rights of Arabs living in Israel.
Yep.
In general, Meretz-Yachad is the party that most of PA would support in a given election. Pro welfare state, pro LGBT rights, pro affirmative action, etc.
OK, you're just dancing around trying to "explain" things instead of answering straightforward questions. Those questions that have been posited but not answered:
Does Meretz-Yachad oppose the current Israeli incursion into Gaza?
If the answer to that question is yes, then the follow-up is: Why the fuck weren't they banned along with these other two parties?
And it looks like the answer to that question is "because it's not made up of Arabs." Do you see where we're going with this?
No one mentioned Hadash which consists mostly of Arabs (with the only exclusion of Dov Hanin) and was not disqualified. That said, it does define itself as Jewish-Arab, and it is a bit less radical in its presented views (plus, I think their communists :P).
So this happened in 2003 as well, against the same two parties from the same source?
Prior to that from some googling news articles, it only came up in the 80s where they tried to ban two parties, and only successfully banned one (for incitement to racism) and reversed it on the other (claiming it wasn't possible to prove the party wanted to negate israel's existence"
I'm still not entirely sure why banning a party is considered okay. If they're preaching something horrible, run on that as an issue and beat them in the polls.
So this happened in 2003 as well, against the same two parties from the same source?
Prior to that from some googling news articles, it only came up in the 80s where they tried to ban two parties, and only successfully banned one (for incitement to racism) and reversed it on the other (claiming it wasn't possible to prove the party wanted to negate israel's existence"
I'm still not entirely sure why banning a party is considered okay. If they're preaching something horrible, run on that as an issue and beat them in the polls.
Well I guess, for example with inciting racial hatred, even if they don't win the election they can still use the election to spread a lot of racial hatred. That sort of thing is illegal in a lot of countries even if you aren't a political party, so it would stand to reason that a political party should be disbanded for engaging in it. Certainly everyone involved should be arrested and tried.
I mean, I wouldn't be lamenting the end of democracy in the UK if they jailed everyone who was a member of the BNP.
Unfortunately, it seems to me that Israeli civilians get held accountable by foreign countries for some of the shit their government does with alarming consistency.
As someone who has gotten into a scuffle in a Belgian bar over a President I didn't vote for, this isn't an Israeli-only phenomenon.
As an American who travels abroad, I want to hear that story. I guess this isn't the place for it, so...
Not much to tell.
"George Bush is an asshole, and Americans are all assholes for electing him."
"I didn't vote for him. I think he's an asshole too."
"Shut up, you asshole." *push*
Here my limited language skills breakdown and I basically just push the drunk Belgian away and let him fall. Then my more lingually inclined friends sort things out.
As it applies here, it's just a case of blanket assumptions about a people (Israelis) based on the idiots they put in power. It's a fairly natural leap to generalize like that, but it's very rarely accurate in the least.
So this happened in 2003 as well, against the same two parties from the same source?
Prior to that from some googling news articles, it only came up in the 80s where they tried to ban two parties, and only successfully banned one (for incitement to racism) and reversed it on the other (claiming it wasn't possible to prove the party wanted to negate israel's existence"
I'm still not entirely sure why banning a party is considered okay. If they're preaching something horrible, run on that as an issue and beat them in the polls.
Well I guess, for example with inciting racial hatred, even if they don't win the election they can still use the election to spread a lot of racial hatred. That sort of thing is illegal in a lot of countries even if you aren't a political party, so it would stand to reason that a political party should be disbanded for engaging in it. Certainly everyone involved should be arrested and tried.
I mean, I wouldn't be lamenting the end of democracy in the UK if they jailed everyone who was a member of the BNP.
See, I'm against disbanding a political party. Now, if members are doing something out and out illegal, arrest the members. That's a function of the police. At that point if they're all doing it and the party lacks anyone not in jail for crimes, whatever. But this is just the people running against the party saying the other side can't get votes. It's the equivalent of the retarded shit spewed in US elections actually causing disqualifications instead of just being stupid shit to sway votes. If Obama hadn't been allowed to run for president because someone said he wasn't a US citizen, _proof_ be damned.
This is the most pedantic, useless bloviating and it always gets brought up.
If 95% of people mean anti-Jewish when they say anti-Semetic, stop typing useless shit to look smart and just accept it.
It's still nigh-meaningless. "Jew" can represent a Culture, a Race, a Religion, or the summation of all three, and the Culture and Religion vary between regions.
Really? By whom? Whenever I bitch about Israel's actions, it's always about what the government is doing, and I haven't read anything in the two Israel threads that indicates people are blaming anyone but the government and the politicians.
Um...Hamas etc.?
I mean, it isn't just Israeli government officials who are dying in the rocket attacks from what I've heard. The IDF aren't the only people bombing civilians in this exchange etc. Nothing says "held accountable" like a rocket in your bagel.
Well if you're gonna look at it that way, then Israelis are holding the Palestinian people accountable for the actions of Hamas. Except, in a vastly more disproportional way. I hope you're not arguing that it's okay for Israelis to take this stance but not okay for Palestinians to do the same.
Really? By whom? Whenever I bitch about Israel's actions, it's always about what the government is doing, and I haven't read anything in the two Israel threads that indicates people are blaming anyone but the government and the politicians.
Um...Hamas etc.?
I mean, it isn't just Israeli government officials who are dying in the rocket attacks from what I've heard. The IDF aren't the only people bombing civilians in this exchange etc. Nothing says "held accountable" like a rocket in your bagel.
Well if you're gonna look at it that way, then Israelis are holding the Palestinian people accountable for the actions of Hamas. Except, in a vastly more disproportional way. I hope you're not arguing that it's okay for Israelis to take this stance but not okay for Palestinians to do the same.
Not at all, I think it's utterly unacceptable on both sides. I was just responding directly to the comments at hand.
for all the goals the 'yea' voters had in mind with this ban, would they have banned a Jewish party that presented the same obstacles?
By this, do you mean "would they have banned a Jewish party that opposed the war?"
I don't want to get too specific with the reasoning, because some of ya'll think the main thing was the war- some of ya'll think this is more a "I've been waiting a long time to set back the Arabs..." kind of thing in general, etc. Whatever you think the main motive was- the main "why we have to get 'dem 'dere Arab parties out da' way", if an all Jewish party presented the exact same 'conflict' with the ruling party's interests, would they have been banned as well?
Well aren't there some pretty liberal Jewish parties to?
From what I can gather, Meretz-Yachad are against the war. Hell, they want to give the Palestinians their own state, dismantle Israeli settlements in the Bank, and ensure rights of Arabs living in Israel.
Yep.
In general, Meretz-Yachad is the party that most of PA would support in a given election. Pro welfare state, pro LGBT rights, pro affirmative action, etc.
OK, you're just dancing around trying to "explain" things instead of answering straightforward questions. Those questions that have been posited but not answered:
Does Meretz-Yachad oppose the current Israeli incursion into Gaza?
If the answer to that question is yes, then the follow-up is: Why the fuck weren't they banned along with these other two parties?
And it looks like the answer to that question is "because it's not made up of Arabs." Do you see where we're going with this?
If they did publicly come out against the war, the answer is probably that there are fewer members of that party is the Knesset then there are Arabs outside the banned parties, so nobody cares. They also weren't mentioned in the report of the near riot in the Knesset (or was it the council?), where the two ultranationalist parties got into a pissing contest with the two Arab parties. Guess who won?
Does anybody know whether the three major parties (Labour, Likud, Kadima) are secular of Jewish? It sounds like Labour is the Israeli branch of an international party, so I'm guessing it's secular.
This is the most pedantic, useless bloviating and it always gets brought up.
If 95% of people mean anti-Jewish when they say anti-Semetic, stop typing useless shit to look smart and just accept it.
It's still nigh-meaningless. "Jew" can represent a Culture, a Race, a Religion, or the summation of all three, and the Culture and Religion vary between regions.
Don't make me bust out an eye-roll. There are a lot of people who don't like Jews and are prejudiced against them. If you want some clarification on the catagories of their distaste you can knock around their websites for a bit.
When people say someone has this prejudiced mindset by saying they are anti-semitic it isn't some baffling enigma of inexact communication.
This is the most pedantic, useless bloviating and it always gets brought up.
If 95% of people mean anti-Jewish when they say anti-Semetic, stop typing useless shit to look smart and just accept it.
It's still nigh-meaningless. "Jew" can represent a Culture, a Race, a Religion, or the summation of all three, and the Culture and Religion vary between regions.
Don't make me bust out an eye-roll. There are a lot of people who don't like Jews and are prejudiced against them. If you want some clarification on the catagories of their distaste you can knock around their websites for a bit.
When people say someone has this prejudiced mindset by saying they are anti-semitic it isn't some baffling enigma of inexact communication.
Its basically like how Indians are technically Asians, but no one thinks of them when they use the term Asian.
I don't understand. Isn't this a country that is entirely defined by being Jewish? Obviously they don't want their Jewish homeland to become a Muslim country simply because more Muslims live there than Jews. I understand that looking at it from a purely neutral point of view it is racist for them to ban a certain religion from government, but shit, you have to be protestant (or at least not catholic, not sure which) to be King or Queen of the UK and no one seems to complain about that because this is a country that has been pretty much defined by the fact it is Protestant.
Unless I am mistaken the King or Queen is also the head of the Anglican church? That would be akin to suggesting the Pope shouldn't be Roman Catholic.
The UK is actually a really bad example to use to counter this since in the UK at the highest levels of power tradition has almost the force of law, and tradition dictates that the ruler not interfere with peoples religious lives in any way. The UK has a state religion it is true, but there in fact has been no greater force for freedom of religion in the UK than that. Since we have already selected the most boring religion in the world to be our state religion we are safe to put religion where it belongs, running craft fairs and bake sales, and maintaining pretty buildings. The CoE, as official religion, is bound by tradition to accept and be nice to all religions. The UK is certainly not defined by having an official church in the same way Iran or Israel is.
This is the most pedantic, useless bloviating and it always gets brought up.
If 95% of people mean anti-Jewish when they say anti-Semetic, stop typing useless shit to look smart and just accept it.
It's still nigh-meaningless. "Jew" can represent a Culture, a Race, a Religion, or the summation of all three, and the Culture and Religion vary between regions.
Don't make me bust out an eye-roll. There are a lot of people who don't like Jews and are prejudiced against them. If you want some clarification on the catagories of their distaste you can knock around their websites for a bit.
When people say someone has this prejudiced mindset by saying they are anti-semitic it isn't some baffling enigma of inexact communication.
Its basically like how Indians are technically Asians, but no one thinks of them when they use the term Asian.
Actually, they're technically Caucasians, as are Jews and Arabs.
People have been confusing ethnicity and race through this entire thread, and they're also confusing the ways that religion are tied to ethnicity, especially among followers Orthodox Judaism. Their motivations are less around racism/ethnicism and more around Fundamentalism, though there is a definite tribal streak to it, due to the history involved. Racism/ethnicism is just an easier card to play, as it was the hot-button of the 20th Century, overriding even the financial struggles.
This is probably the saddest thing I've heard in a long time. How did my country come to support a side of this ridiculous nonsense so staunchly? I hate to put it this way, but it's like the Principal taking the side of the bully in a schoolyard fight.
There's been so much anger and hopelessness in this situation as it is, without this latest development. The great bulk of horrible things that have happened over there have been the result of desperate and hopeless people making irrational decisions that end up harming innocents... surely they can't expect that denying democratic rights in this way is going to somehow produce an increase in hope and a vision of a way out among the people they are marginalizing. What are they hoping to accomplish with moves like this? What good could this possibly do?
Israel’s Central Elections Commission has banned Arab parties. Ackerman sighs. Yglesias calls it a "poorly timed PR move." Yaacov Lozowick says that the decision will almost certainly be overturned:
...the Arab parties will run in the upcoming elections, because the final say is the court's. The decision of yesterday's panel is certain to be struck down...yesterday's vote was pure theatre, a win for all sides. The right-wing politicians who initiated the ban showed themselves fierce defenders of Zionist hard-wingery; the Arab MKs got to shout their worst on national TV, hoping this will encourage a larger percent of their own potential constituents to support them. The Left, most vocally Merertz, had the opportunity to distance themselves from the mainstream, which they're having a hard time doing these days because on the main issue, the operation in Gaza, they can't afford to be to critical since even their voters support it. Whoever dislikes the court will soon be given yet another reason to decry how it intervenes. A fine day was had by all.
This is probably the saddest thing I've heard in a long time. How did my country come to support a side of this ridiculous nonsense so staunchly? I hate to put it this way, but it's like the Principal taking the side of the bully in a schoolyard fight.
There's been so much anger and hopelessness in this situation as it is, without this latest development. The great bulk of horrible things that have happened over there have been the result of desperate and hopeless people making irrational decisions that end up harming innocents... surely they can't expect that denying democratic rights in this way is going to somehow produce an increase in hope and a vision of a way out among the people they are marginalizing. What are they hoping to accomplish with moves like this? What good could this possibly do?
Look hard line to their base, suppress a bit of opposition vote, polarize the electorate, and profit election wise without much of a wrist slap?
Israel’s Central Elections Commission has banned Arab parties. Ackerman sighs. Yglesias calls it a "poorly timed PR move." Yaacov Lozowick says that the decision will almost certainly be overturned:
...the Arab parties will run in the upcoming elections, because the final say is the court's. The decision of yesterday's panel is certain to be struck down...yesterday's vote was pure theatre, a win for all sides. The right-wing politicians who initiated the ban showed themselves fierce defenders of Zionist hard-wingery; the Arab MKs got to shout their worst on national TV, hoping this will encourage a larger percent of their own potential constituents to support them. The Left, most vocally Merertz, had the opportunity to distance themselves from the mainstream, which they're having a hard time doing these days because on the main issue, the operation in Gaza, they can't afford to be to critical since even their voters support it. Whoever dislikes the court will soon be given yet another reason to decry how it intervenes. A fine day was had by all.
If they did publicly come out against the war, the answer is probably that there are fewer members of that party is the Knesset then there are Arabs outside the banned parties, so nobody cares. They also weren't mentioned in the report of the near riot in the Knesset (or was it the council?), where the two ultranationalist parties got into a pissing contest with the two Arab parties. Guess who won?
Does anybody know whether the three major parties (Labour, Likud, Kadima) are secular of Jewish? It sounds like Labour is the Israeli branch of an international party, so I'm guessing it's secular.
I'm really not prepared to let the Israeli Jews off the hook for the behavior of their parties, and here's why:
Kadima 29 (hawkish on the Conflict; founded by a war criminal known as the "Butcher of Beirut")
Labor 18 (currently hawkish on the Conflict, historically supported settlers; any of the really liberal members left for Meretz-Yachad)
Likud 12 (very hawkish on the Conflict, unquestionably very racist--though not quite as much so as Yisreal Beitenu--and previously led by the aforementioned "Butcher of Beirut.")
Shas 12 (ultra-orthodox Jewish party)
Yisreal Beitenu 11 (nativist party; basically Jewish supremacists)
National Union/National Religious Party 9 (religious parties with strong ties to Yisreal Beitenu)
United Torah Judaism 6 (ultra-orthodox Jewish party)
So, there's 97 of your 120 Knesset seats. Keep in mind that Arabs make up 20% of the population of Israel. Then, you've got your pensioners, who really don't concern themselves with much other than old Jewish people, but are currently allied with Kadima (so really, I could probably add seven more seats to the Kadima camp), though the only reason they even have seats is due to protest votes from younger people. Then, you've got your Balad and United Arab List/Ta'al, the Arab parties, with seven seats. Meretz-Yachad, who are hella left-wing, and have a few Arab members, with five seats. And the Arab-Jewish Alliance, Hadash, with 3 seats. Basically, the overwhelming majority of these parties are incredibly theocratic and/or pretty racist against Arabs. And by "overwhelming majority," I mean 80%. So, we're not talking about some bare majority, here, that just manages to just beat the threshold; we're talking, like, if every self-described Christian in the U.S. supported a racist/theocratic coalition party, including people who don't go to church at all, people who only show up on Christmas and Easter, and hella liberal movements like the Unitarian Universalists. This is not some minority movement in Israel; this is a substantial majority movement, and we're talking about positions which are essentially taken by every party except the Arabs and the Communists.
So yes, I hold the Israeli Jews responsible for this sort of entrenched, government-supported oppression, because they've pretty much universally voted for it, with the exception of a few very small minorities.
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I can't wait until these two ultranationalist parties bring a motion forcing all arabs to wear crescent armbands. It'll be like 1933 all over again!
Because:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Democratic_Party_of_Germany_(NPD)
Yeah, at one time the British royal family answered to Rome and it was expected of any monarch to be Catholic or become Catholic (everybody in Europe basically was at that time anyway). Then Henry VIII ditched the Pope and created the Anglican Church so he could get a divorce and since then the King or Queen of Britain has been the Supreme Governor of the Church of England. Effectively the Church of England is 'sort of' Catholic but also Reformed. But you don't have to be Anglican to be King or Queen, you need to be an immediate descendant of the previous Monarch. And then I guess you become head of the church of England by default anyway.
Which is all very much by the by because the British royal family doesn't functionally rule the country any more anyway. Also, we're talking about a monarchy versus an elected government here. Political parties in the UK are not required to be affiliated with the Anglican or any other church. Certainly appearing to be affiliated with a popular religion helps win you votes (rumours abound of Blair switching denominations in order to gain popularity amongst certain demographics) but it is not strictly necessary. They are expected to be elected representatives of the people, not of God. The populace of Israel is not 100% Jewish, there are plenty of Christians and Muslims and no doubt other denominations and atheists who are Israeli citizens and if Israel wishes to consider itself a democracy they can't exclude non-Jewish citizens from having representation in government.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7825032.stm
Don't see anything on Finnish news yet, although there is an article that says that Israel is using experimental weapons in Gaza. Dense Inert Metal Explosives or something.
This is the most pedantic, useless bloviating and it always gets brought up.
If 95% of people mean anti-Jewish when they say anti-Semetic, stop typing useless shit to look smart and just accept it.
National Union: Yeah...
I don't get this. How will banning them solve that problem other than radicalizing them further?
A sure fire way of starting a civil war in your country is to block representatives of a large portion of citizens from entering government.
So, they basically want to make Israel an official theocracy?
Cool. It's not like Middle-East has any of those.
Now, couple of things:
A. They do this EVERY BLOODY ELECTIONS. And every time the courts tell they can't do that, this won't hold till the elections (and yes, like always, the government will abide by this).
B. Most democratic countries has some form of party disqualification if they are not democratic (like, but not limited to supporting violence or terror, please see article 49 of the Italic Constitution or the Ley Organica de Partidos Politicos from Spain, or the Dutch Civil Code, Article 2 or the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Germany, Article 21(2) and I can go on).
C. The declared reason behind this move by the Knesset was that the Parties were supporting the armed struggle against Israel, i.e killing Israeli troopers. Not opposing the war itself but actively promoting it.
My opinion, and I apologize as I usually try to refrain from using harsh language in my posts:
This move is fucking bullshit, what the fuck were they thinking?! This obviously undemocratic, and I don't care how much of a 'roid rage you're on from the war, this kind of thing is simply unacceptable.
I mean, bloody hell, you can- not agree with them, you can hate them, you can curse them, yell at them, but YOU CAN'T TAKE AWAY THEIR RIGHT TO BE VOTED FOR, LESS THEN A MONTH BEFORE THE ELECTIONS.
If the ICJ (Israeli High Court of Justice) doesn't reverse this decision, I personally going to go and demonstrate.
Fucking hypocrites. This is what happens when you get baboons in the parliament, I'm just surprised they're not throwing feces at each other.
P.S
Please don't get the wrong impressions about Israelis in general from this. Alot of us do not agree with this move at all.
They tried to bury us. They didn't know that we were seeds. 2018 Midterms. Get your shit together.
Um...Hamas etc.?
I mean, it isn't just Israeli government officials who are dying in the rocket attacks from what I've heard. The IDF aren't the only people bombing civilians in this exchange etc. Nothing says "held accountable" like a rocket in your bagel.
Didn't the US do that with some rather horrible voter suppression strategies? Specifically regarding autodialing your opponent's phone banks to render them inoperable?
OK, you're just dancing around trying to "explain" things instead of answering straightforward questions. Those questions that have been posited but not answered:
Does Meretz-Yachad oppose the current Israeli incursion into Gaza?
If the answer to that question is yes, then the follow-up is: Why the fuck weren't they banned along with these other two parties?
And it looks like the answer to that question is "because it's not made up of Arabs." Do you see where we're going with this?
Prior to that from some googling news articles, it only came up in the 80s where they tried to ban two parties, and only successfully banned one (for incitement to racism) and reversed it on the other (claiming it wasn't possible to prove the party wanted to negate israel's existence"
I'm still not entirely sure why banning a party is considered okay. If they're preaching something horrible, run on that as an issue and beat them in the polls.
Well I guess, for example with inciting racial hatred, even if they don't win the election they can still use the election to spread a lot of racial hatred. That sort of thing is illegal in a lot of countries even if you aren't a political party, so it would stand to reason that a political party should be disbanded for engaging in it. Certainly everyone involved should be arrested and tried.
I mean, I wouldn't be lamenting the end of democracy in the UK if they jailed everyone who was a member of the BNP.
"George Bush is an asshole, and Americans are all assholes for electing him."
"I didn't vote for him. I think he's an asshole too."
"Shut up, you asshole." *push*
Here my limited language skills breakdown and I basically just push the drunk Belgian away and let him fall. Then my more lingually inclined friends sort things out.
As it applies here, it's just a case of blanket assumptions about a people (Israelis) based on the idiots they put in power. It's a fairly natural leap to generalize like that, but it's very rarely accurate in the least.
They tried to bury us. They didn't know that we were seeds. 2018 Midterms. Get your shit together.
See, I'm against disbanding a political party. Now, if members are doing something out and out illegal, arrest the members. That's a function of the police. At that point if they're all doing it and the party lacks anyone not in jail for crimes, whatever. But this is just the people running against the party saying the other side can't get votes. It's the equivalent of the retarded shit spewed in US elections actually causing disqualifications instead of just being stupid shit to sway votes. If Obama hadn't been allowed to run for president because someone said he wasn't a US citizen, _proof_ be damned.
It's still nigh-meaningless. "Jew" can represent a Culture, a Race, a Religion, or the summation of all three, and the Culture and Religion vary between regions.
Well if you're gonna look at it that way, then Israelis are holding the Palestinian people accountable for the actions of Hamas. Except, in a vastly more disproportional way. I hope you're not arguing that it's okay for Israelis to take this stance but not okay for Palestinians to do the same.
Not at all, I think it's utterly unacceptable on both sides. I was just responding directly to the comments at hand.
If they did publicly come out against the war, the answer is probably that there are fewer members of that party is the Knesset then there are Arabs outside the banned parties, so nobody cares. They also weren't mentioned in the report of the near riot in the Knesset (or was it the council?), where the two ultranationalist parties got into a pissing contest with the two Arab parties. Guess who won?
Does anybody know whether the three major parties (Labour, Likud, Kadima) are secular of Jewish? It sounds like Labour is the Israeli branch of an international party, so I'm guessing it's secular.
2003, overturned by the supreme court.
Same players that time around, both in initiation of the disqualification and in the targets.
Don't make me bust out an eye-roll. There are a lot of people who don't like Jews and are prejudiced against them. If you want some clarification on the catagories of their distaste you can knock around their websites for a bit.
When people say someone has this prejudiced mindset by saying they are anti-semitic it isn't some baffling enigma of inexact communication.
Its basically like how Indians are technically Asians, but no one thinks of them when they use the term Asian.
The UK is actually a really bad example to use to counter this since in the UK at the highest levels of power tradition has almost the force of law, and tradition dictates that the ruler not interfere with peoples religious lives in any way. The UK has a state religion it is true, but there in fact has been no greater force for freedom of religion in the UK than that. Since we have already selected the most boring religion in the world to be our state religion we are safe to put religion where it belongs, running craft fairs and bake sales, and maintaining pretty buildings. The CoE, as official religion, is bound by tradition to accept and be nice to all religions. The UK is certainly not defined by having an official church in the same way Iran or Israel is.
People have been confusing ethnicity and race through this entire thread, and they're also confusing the ways that religion are tied to ethnicity, especially among followers Orthodox Judaism. Their motivations are less around racism/ethnicism and more around Fundamentalism, though there is a definite tribal streak to it, due to the history involved. Racism/ethnicism is just an easier card to play, as it was the hot-button of the 20th Century, overriding even the financial struggles.
There's been so much anger and hopelessness in this situation as it is, without this latest development. The great bulk of horrible things that have happened over there have been the result of desperate and hopeless people making irrational decisions that end up harming innocents... surely they can't expect that denying democratic rights in this way is going to somehow produce an increase in hope and a vision of a way out among the people they are marginalizing. What are they hoping to accomplish with moves like this? What good could this possibly do?
Look hard line to their base, suppress a bit of opposition vote, polarize the electorate, and profit election wise without much of a wrist slap?
What about the moderate parties?
Kadima 29 (hawkish on the Conflict; founded by a war criminal known as the "Butcher of Beirut")
Labor 18 (currently hawkish on the Conflict, historically supported settlers; any of the really liberal members left for Meretz-Yachad)
Likud 12 (very hawkish on the Conflict, unquestionably very racist--though not quite as much so as Yisreal Beitenu--and previously led by the aforementioned "Butcher of Beirut.")
Shas 12 (ultra-orthodox Jewish party)
Yisreal Beitenu 11 (nativist party; basically Jewish supremacists)
National Union/National Religious Party 9 (religious parties with strong ties to Yisreal Beitenu)
United Torah Judaism 6 (ultra-orthodox Jewish party)
So, there's 97 of your 120 Knesset seats. Keep in mind that Arabs make up 20% of the population of Israel. Then, you've got your pensioners, who really don't concern themselves with much other than old Jewish people, but are currently allied with Kadima (so really, I could probably add seven more seats to the Kadima camp), though the only reason they even have seats is due to protest votes from younger people. Then, you've got your Balad and United Arab List/Ta'al, the Arab parties, with seven seats. Meretz-Yachad, who are hella left-wing, and have a few Arab members, with five seats. And the Arab-Jewish Alliance, Hadash, with 3 seats. Basically, the overwhelming majority of these parties are incredibly theocratic and/or pretty racist against Arabs. And by "overwhelming majority," I mean 80%. So, we're not talking about some bare majority, here, that just manages to just beat the threshold; we're talking, like, if every self-described Christian in the U.S. supported a racist/theocratic coalition party, including people who don't go to church at all, people who only show up on Christmas and Easter, and hella liberal movements like the Unitarian Universalists. This is not some minority movement in Israel; this is a substantial majority movement, and we're talking about positions which are essentially taken by every party except the Arabs and the Communists.
So yes, I hold the Israeli Jews responsible for this sort of entrenched, government-supported oppression, because they've pretty much universally voted for it, with the exception of a few very small minorities.