Sunday, December 28, 2003 Ha`aretz
So this Jew, Arab, Georgian and Samaritan go to court...
By Moshe Gorali
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/376724.html

The state denies there is any such nationality as `Israeli' A group of
Israeli public figures last week petitioned the High Court of Justice to
order the Interior Ministry to register them as Israelis. "We're Israeli,
and wish to be registered as such," said the petition, presented by Attorney
Yoela Har-Shefi.

The Interior Ministry has a list of 137 nationalities, including Abkhazi,
Assyrian and Samaritan - but you won't find "Israeli" among them. The State
of Israel doesn't recognize the existence of "Israeli" as a nationality.

The petitioning group is headed by Professor Uzi Ornan of the Hebrew
University and the Technion and the 38 intellectuals, academics and
scientists include Shulamit Aloni, Uri and Rahel Avneri, Yehoshua Sobol,
Gavriel Solomon, Yigal Eilam, Meron Benvenisti, Yehoshua Porat and Oren
Yifta'el.

Also in the group is singer Alon Olearchik, formerly of the army Nahal
entertainment group and the Israeli rock band Caveret - his mother is
Christian and father Jewish, so he is not Jewish. Adal Ka'adan, the Israeli
Arab who tried in vain to buy a house in the Katzir community, also wants to
be registered as Israeli.

Among the petitioners are those categorized on the identity cards as "Jew,"
"Druze," "Georgian," "Russian," and even one "Hebrew." Not one of them is
"Israeli," and the reason is simple - the Israeli state does not recognize
any Israeli nationality that isn't Jewish. Even the Supreme Court ruled in
1970 that there was no such thing as Israeli nationality.

Georg Rafael Tamrin returned from a visit overseas to find a new law - an
amendment to the law following the "who is a Jew" affair - ruling that to be
an Israeli one must be a member of "the Jewish nation." Tamrin asked the
population registrar to change the nationality clause in his identity card
from "Jewish" to "Israeli." He maintained that "there is already a definite
Israeli nationality today, to which I belong according to all subjective
criteria - identification, feeling of belonging, loyalty and declaring it."

Tel Aviv District Court Judge Yitzhak Shilo rejected Tamrin's suit stating
"a person cannot create a new nationality just by saying it exists, and then
say he belongs to it." Shilo then added the real reason: "I can fully
declare that there is no Israeli nation that exists separately from a Jewish
nation."

Tamrin appealed to the High Court of Justice, which adopted the District
Court's position. Justice Shimon Agranat denounced the petitioner: "If a
handful of people or more wish to separate themselves from the Jewish
people - only 23 years after the establishment of the state - and acquire
the status of a separate Israeli nation, this separatist trend should not be
regarded as legitimate and should not be recognized."

Who is a Druze?

The new petition challenges these conclusions. Professor Ornan, formerly the
chairman of the League Against Religious Coercion and the Israeli secular
movement, is the chairman of the "I am Israeli" organization, which has
collected more than 2,000 signatures of Israelis. One petitioner, former Air
Force commander General Benny Peled, died, but signed a power of attorney
for the group.

Another petitioner is Druze businessman Carmel Wahaba. In 1990 he and his
French partners wished to set up an import-export company in France. The
company's registration required a notarized translation of his birth
certificate.

When the French clerk saw the translated documents, he scolded Wahaba:
"What's a Druze nationality? I know of no Druze state. Do you want to tell
me that there is a Druze state within the State of Israel?"

Wahaba, who was suspected of trying to trick the French authorities, tried
to explain but the clerk would have none of it, demanding authorization from
the embassy that the translation was accurate and that Wahaba was indeed an
Israeli whose nationality was Druze.

Petitioner David Yanukshvili, a pensioner, is registered as "Georgian." The
petition says: "He abandoned Georgia and wishes to conduct his whole life in
the State of Israel, not merely as a citizen but as a member of the Israeli
nation. Why is the Georgian nationality being foisted on him?"

Ornan once classified himself as Canaanite, a member of an ideological group
whose founders included the late poet Yonatan Ratosh. When Ratosh's ID was
lost, the Interior Ministry issued him a new one, citing his nationality as
"Jewish." Ratosh hastened to appeal to the High Court of Justice to be
registered as "Hebrew" again - a term which appears on the Interior
Ministry's list of nationalities.

"What is the Hebrew nationality?" asks the petition. "Just because two or
three obstinate people insisted on their right to be registered as such, and
the High Court consented, a Hebrew nationality was created, while the firm
reality of an Israeli nationality is not recognized as such? It seems to us
that the right of tens of thousands, who declared their nationality to be
Israeli, is no less than the right of the Hebrews, whose right was
recognized."

Social harmony

The petitioners believe every man has a right to belong to the nationality
of his choice. It is not right to force a person to be classified according
to his religion in an essential official document, since this leads to
discrimination against members of various religions.

It is even less proper to force an atheist or someone openly hostile to
religion to be identified with his "religion," since this is a kind of
religious coercion.

The petition further says that "Israel and any representative Jewish
organization are always fighting tooth and nail against mentioning that a
person is `Jewish' in official documents of other states. How come something
that is an abomination when done by others, becomes worthy and kosher when
we do it?"

In democratic Western states citizenship is usually identical in meaning to
nationality. In Israel the clause "citizenship" in the population
registration office is accompanied by another clause called "nationality."
Hence "nationality" and "citizenship" in Israel are two different things.

About three years ago, when the High Court instructed then Interior Minister
Eli Yishai to register Reform converts as "Jews" in the nationality clause,
the minister ordered the clause to be canceled in IDs. Instead of "Jew" a
row of stars appears now. A lady who applied for a new ID when her old one
wore out was amazed to find stars instead of her Jewish identity. She
appealed to the High Court of Justice to reinstate the "Jew" classification.

Attorney Har-Shefi expects both petitions to be debated together so that the
court can examine the affiliation between Judaism and being Israeli. There
is no contradiction between the two, she says. Just like there is an
American Jew, there can be an Israeli Jew.

"The American Jew is both American by nationality and Jewish, and so is the
French Jew or the Norwegian Jew. We believe that an Israeli Jew is also
eligible to be called Israeli, while being a member of the Israeli
nationality, like his brother who belongs to the American nationality," the
petition says.

The arguments go into values, interests and comparative law, the right of
man for self definition, equality, realizing his rights from the Declaration
of Independence and even strengthening the harmony in Israeli society.

The petition also cites the Or Commission's ruling that "a central goal of
the state's activity must be obtaining real equality for the state's Arab
citizens. Recognizing the right of all those who feel that way - both Jews
and Arabs - and want to define themselves as Israelis, would open the way to
minimizing discrimination, helping reconciliation, and establishing all
Israelis identification with their state."

According to surveys, Har-Shefi says 60 percent of Israeli Arabs would jump
at the chance of being registered as Israelis. Today only about 25 percent
of them are registered as Israelis.

As for Jews, the recognition of the Israeli nationality would remove a
source of dispute and division both among Israeli Jews and between Israel's
Jews and the diaspora Jews, the petition says.

The petition's main object is separating state from religion, or at least
separating religion from nationality. Petitioner Nili Kook is the widow of
Professor Hillel Kook, who died two years ago.

"He told me that his great uncle, Rabbi Kook, would have supported the
petition. Like the late Professor Yeshayahu Leibovitz, he wished to separate
religion from nationality and the state. They believed only such separation
would increase respect for religion in Israel," Har-Shefi says.

The appointment of Avraham Poraz as Interior Minister raised hopes among the
petitioners but their requests to him, like their letters to Haim Ramon when
he was Interior Minister, went unheeded. The loaded issue was shelved. A
petition to the High Court is a good way to raise an issue for the agenda,
but it is doubtful whether the High Court is the right address.

As Judge Shilo said, a nationality is not created by saying it exists. It is
hard to assume that the judges say so would create the Israeli nationality.
On the other hand, Supreme Court President Justice Aharon Barak is retiring
in about three years and perhaps history, in the form of 38 "Israelis," has
provided him with the last big case to create another revolution.