re israel an apartheid state not quite in article srg cinnj early bird think com shaig think com shai guday writes in article spam maths adelaide edu au jaskew spam maths adelaide edu au joseph askew writes please cite specific examples where an arab party member was rejected while a jewish party member was accepted if you look at the bottom of this article you will see that i have very kindly dug up one of yigal arens previous postings entirely without his permission i hope he doesn t mind containing translations from ha arezt detailing just such a case perhaps you think that ha arezt lies would you like to provide me with an assurance that this practise never occurs if you examine these i am sure you will discover that the arab party member did not have the power base that his jewish counterpart had right arabs have been voting in israel for how long and in all that time not one arab ever gained enough of a personal following to get his fellow party members to put in a ministry this is about as likely as sprouting wings and flying to rio what basis do you have for explaining this odd failure you seem very confident that you are right exactly how do you know why are you sure once again if for arguments sake all the arab israelis were to vote for labor at the next election you can rest assured that the number of arab mks and cabinet members would increase proportionately to the power shift exactly what basis do you have for saying this when the labour party has never put an arab into a cabinet post and insists its coalition members do the same why and on what basis are you reassuring me in the face of years of discriminatory practise you are overlooking the fact that they wield political power as individuals based upon a wider collective power base hey what as i said even when their party puts them up they get knocked back it surely couldn t be because they are arabs is it the reasoning i see at work is purely political as far as security goes i think that some serious gaffs were made by right wing jews as well e g sharon well yes but security is the reason most often given by people who want to make excuses i merely thought it would crop up and so pre empted it start of article all commets in are mine not dr arens comments in square brackets are mine yigal from the other front july translation of ha aretz article racism in the knesset coalition requirements on one hand and the presence of progressive mks from meretz in the coalition on the other have compelled rabin and his friends to change to some extent their attitude towards the arab public and their representatives in the knesset although he did refuse to view them as partners taking part in the coalition and joining the government he did agree to meet with them and to give them a document of intentions which included a commitment to work towards a decrease in the discrimination between jewish and arab citizens decrease what but posters have told us time and again that such discrimination does not exist at all is rabin too a closet self hater yigal however racism has not disappeared when the knesset sat to consider who would staff its various committees a request was made to put an mk from hadash the communist party one of the arab parties yigal on the state comptroller s committee and oh did that ever stir up a storm including in the ranks of labor since many knesset members find it unthinkable that an arab mk sit on one of the important house committees security secrets are liable to fall into their hands this attitude which until recently had not even aroused criticism being so natural and so deeply embossed upon people s hearts holds that there are knesset members who despite having been elected by tens of thousands of votes are not entitled to be full partners in the body which represents the people of israel we are not speaking here of political discrimination which would be bad enough in itself but of racial discrimination the proof one of the compromises proposed was that mk mahamid an arab yigal should be replaced by tamar gojanski a jew yigal from the same party it was not the member s party which was considered unfit but his race here is a documented case in a respected israeli newspaper it is worth noting that for the first time since the state s founding a public debate has arisen on this subject as witness the following article a test of self confidence by gid on levi ha aretz july revelations of discrimination against arabs have become such an integral part of our daily routine that there is not much effort made to deal with them do you hear that please contact this levi fellow and explain to him how little he knows about israel please yigal except that sometimes the demon bursts out from behind the government s window dressing and then the phenomenon is seven times more serious last week provided two more such examples the israeli knesset is finding it very difficult to allow arab representation on its more important committees and israel television is finding it no less difficult to give a platform to arabs from the territories seemingly two entirely different matters but in fact they are one and the same the th knesset proved last week that even though one third of its members are new faces it has not renewed its own face at all at least on one issue parliamentary traditions may be modernized and parliamentary traditions may become obsolete and only one tradition endures forever no arab shall set foot in the more important committees of the house there has never been and never will be an arab mk on the external affairs and defense committee or on the finance committee worlds have been overturned over the question of whether or not to give arabs for the first time a place on the state comptroller s committee the arguments are old and well known in all three of the above committees innumerable secrets are revealed and woe unto us if an arab should hear them one must not make light of such arguments but their significance should also not be exaggerated every arab mk is not spending all his time waiting for the opportune moment to hand over information from the knesset committee room to black panther headquarters in jenin and not all the aforementioned committees are continually occupied in the discussion of top secret matters which could safely be revealed for example to mks supportive of the jewish underground but not to an arab mk from the likud labor or even from hadash the arabs themselves would probably forego membership in the subcommittee on secret service matters but what would happen one may ask if mk nawaf masalha were to hear god forbid a review of the foreign minister in an open meeting of the foreign affairs and defense committee or even a review of the army chief of staff which in any case are regularly leaked to the next edition of the news and what would happen if mk hashem mahamid were to report on what he had seen with his own eyes at al najah their non participation in important committees and that of their colleagues creates an intolerable situation where arab members of the elected house have only semi positions they are good enough for addressing plenary sessions and for voting for or against the government and participating in the deliberations of the immigration and absorption committee but they must not for example participate in the process of formulating the state budget in the finance committee or in the allocation of resources to local authorities in any case they have little part in that labor s dependence on the support of the arab parties has brought about some improvement mk hashem mahamid will it seems participate in the state comptroller s committee earlier there had been a ridiculous attempt made to dictate to hadash who their representative should be and thus to prevent the arab from entering this dubious holy of holies but it soon became clear that there was no legal or constitutional backing for such a step but not to worry even now the jewish mind is contriving devices the new committee chair roni milo has already announced that he will set up subcommittees aplenty for his committee thus he will decide where it is permissible for mahamid to participate and where not a solution such as this could by the way also have been adopted for the rest of the committees thereby completely eliminating the fear of state secrets being leaked to the enemy and removing the stain of discrimination from the knesset end article do you accept that as documentation joseph askew joseph askew gauche and proud in the autumn stillness see the pleiades jaskew spam maths adelaide edu remote in thorny deserts fell the grief disclaimer sue see if i care north of our tents the sky must end somwhere actually i rather like brenda beyond the pale the river murmurs on
