A couple of days ago, a news item in Haaretz exposed (again) the most vexing problem that Israeli democracy has to deal with, and should have dealt with long ago. The article probably was seen by most readers, but if they already decided to read it, it probably did not leave a lasting impression. The title of the item: “Israeli town sued for refusal to enroll ‘non-Jew’ in its religious school”.
In short, a boy, a six-year old from Ramle was designated by the school, and the municipality of Ramle, as not Jewish because his mother, who immigrated to Israel nineteen years ago under the Law of Return, is according to Halacha considered not Jewish, and thus neither is her son.
The State of Israel, allowed her to come as an immigrant to Israel but the Jewish establishment will not give her, or her children, the rights that she is entitled to as an Israeli.
Similar stories crop up every now and then, (and I am sure most of them do not even become public). Soldiers that are more or less forced to convert, people who are not able to get married, children that are not recognized as Jews, sometimes even many years after they were born and initially registered as Jews, the refusal to have deceased dear ones buried in the cemetery nearby. And these are only the blatant, crude instances of religious dictatorship, and there is no doubt that below the surface, many more instances of discrimination take place on a daily basis, that are ignored and probably denied.
When is this going to end? When will Israel stop discriminating against its own citizens and allow them to be treated as second class, even if the law is on their side? Why does a six-year-old boy be made to feel he is less than his mates? Why does he already that young be let down by the country he was born in?
A feeling of optimism may be gotten from the fact that the Ramle municipality and the school are currently being sued for damages, by no less than the Justice Ministry, that has demanded financial compensation for the boy and his mother, as well as an apology. But, since the case is public, both parents and pupils in the school will know the identity of the boy and he will have to carry this “stigma”.
Is this really what Judaism is all about?
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