The Cultural Code of - PowerPoint Presentation

Slide1

The Cultural Code of

Jewishness

Amanda

Mindlin

Kevin

Khosrowzadeh

Angela StevensonSlide2

The main characteristic of the social and political order in Israel is its definition as a “Jewish state,” which tends to blur the boundaries between nationalism and religion.

This chapter analyzes Jewish

primordialism

and its institutional and legal consequences.

The cultural, social, economic, and constitutional conditions of

primordialism

reinforce one another, raising the “Jewish consensus” above all other conflicting cultures.

However, the state is also administered by Western universal secular codes.

Although most Israeli Jews are secular, their collective identity is largely defined by terms, values, symbols, and collective memory still anchored in the Jewish religion.

The two conflicting value systems are usually managed by compartmentalization and the application of different values in different contexts and social spheres. Slide3

The Construction of womanhood

Gender inequality in the socioeconomic sphere in Israel resembles that in most Western states.

However, in most Western liberal democracies, men and women at least formally share equal legal citizenship.

In Israel women are subject to explicit legal discrimination, because personal status laws are under the jurisdiction of rabbinical courts, which rule according to patriarchal Halachic law.

Recently, secular family courts have been established, but their authority is limited.Slide4

The construction of womanhood

Sociologist

Nitza

Berkovitch

believes that woman in Israel have been constructed, not as equal individual citizens, but first and foremost as mothers and wives.

Demographic threat

 population growth is a national imperative

Defense Service Law (1949) – imposes compulsory service on all physically eligible citizens of the state, except for married or pregnant women, mothers, or women who plead reasons of conscience or religious conviction.

Only about half of the women of relevant age have been drafted over the years and those who have been drafted have not filled the same roles as men

The Women’s Equal Rights Law (1951) – considerably improved the status of women in Israel, but still looked at women as only mothers and wives.

The Israeli state’s basic attitude to women’s citizenship has continued to emphasize their biological and sociological role as mothers and wives.Slide5

The construction of a democracy

Western scholars generally consider Israel to be a democracy.

The following 5 conditions are necessary for a regime to be classified as democratic:

1) Periodic free elections, including the possibility of changing the ruling political elites or parties through such elections.

2) Sovereignty of the people, exercised through a legislative system constructed by a parliament, according to which the judicial system operates. No independent or parallel legislative and judicial system can be created by the state.

3) Equal and inclusive citizenship and equal rights.

4) Universal suffrage where every vote is equal.

5) Protection of the civil and human rights of minorities from the tyranny of the majority.

Only one of the 5 necessary conditions for considering Israel a democracy is present.

Rights within the state are determined more according to ethnic-national religious belonging than according to citizenship.Slide6

State and ethnicity

Whenever the authorities have claimed that “state security” was involved, the High Court of Justice has simply accepted it.

Ex – the High Court’s sanctioning of Israel’s violation of international law in allowing Jewish settlement of the occupied Arab territories.

International law forbids an occupying power to make any substantial changes in the status of occupied territories, except for reasons of security.

Accordingly, from the perspective of the HCJ, all the settlements in the territories were built for security reasons.

The general political culture also condones discrimination against Arabs.Slide7

State and Ethnicity

The state of Israel is committed to being both a Jewish and a democratic state.However, the state’s definition of “

Jewishness

” makes these two concepts mutually contradictory in some respects.

Israel inherited the

millet

system, which subjects citizens to two legal and judicial systems, which are separate and operate according to different, and even opposing, principles.

Judaism has been incorporated into legislation

Immigration laws like the “Law of Return” and “Law of Citizenship” are favorable to Jews, but discriminatory against the Palestinians who fled.

Some laws facilitate granting particularistic benefits only to Jewish citizens of the state - the Law on the Status of the World Zionist Org. and the Social Security Law (requires service in the IDF) (ex. of

Consociational

model)

Agreement between the Jewish National Fund and the Israel Lands Authority prevents the leasing of state lands (93% of territory within Green Line) to non-JewsSlide8

An Immigrant Settler Society In Search of Legitimacy

Israel was founded as an immigrant settler frontier state and is still an active immigrant society. Engaged in a settlement and territorial expansion process down to present dayContinual presence of danger posed by surrounding Arab states. Occupied vs. Administered TerritoriesSlide9

Return to Zion

Zionism distances itself from the global colonial context. Despite advocating immigration and resettlementEmphasized the “Jewish Problem,” anti-Semitism, persecutions, and later the Holocaust. Presented as the sole realistic and moral solution to these ills

Immigrants differed in ethnic, religious, and cultural backgrounds (

ie

“Western” Slide10

Return of Zion – Cont’d…

Constant existential threat to Zionism posed by international community, particularly Palestinian Arabs“The Land of Israel” (ie. Palestine) chosen for ideological-religious reasons, not practical ones. Religious ideas, symbols, and scriptures serve as the backdrop and justification for Israel’s existence.

Return to “Holy Land” provided

collective redemption

to JewsSlide11

Secularization of Nationalism

Zionism has two central goals:Reconstruction or reinvention of Judaism as an essentially modern and secular movement, rather than a religious or civilization

Recruit and concentrate Jews within a territorial framework to enable the establishment of an independent political entity.

Contradictions and tensions led to a social order with semblance to democracy and theocracy. Slide12

Secular roots of Zionsim

Founders of the Zionism (ie. Theodore Herzl) originated from European intelligentsia. Reflects secular, nationalist rootsIdeological commitments also contained elements of socialism and communism

Eurocentric & paralleled colonial movementSlide13

Religious Zionism

Jewish religious nationalists (ie. Religious Zionists) were marginal in the Jewish religious conscious ( viewed as “forcing an end”)Religious worldview, however looked positively to ascent (aliyah) to the Holy Land Slide14

Orthodox Backlash

Zionist movement prompted political organization of the haredim to counter Zionism and secularization in the general political sphere. Augudat Yisrael

(political party of ultra-orthodox) founded in Poland (1912)

Sought to exert role in political arena along with assimilators and secularizersSlide15

…And the Secularization of a Nation

Zionism adopted some central ingredients of the Jewish religion, but gave them different meanings and put them in a national context:World Jewry in one single imaginary community Targeted territory: PalestineReligious symbols and holy tongue,

Hewbrew

, secularized and transformed into an everyday language.

Expropriation and

historicization

of the Bible provided rationale (

ie

. “chosen people,” “Holy Land”)Slide16

Toward an Atheistic Judaism?

First aliyah (ca. 1882-1900) to Palestine consisted of Russian and Romanian modern Orthodox Jews. - Intended to establish religious agricultural communities (moshava

)

Second and third

aliyah

immigrants (ca. 1904-30) had a materialist social vision

Expressed active secularism as opposed to religious Judaism of their parents

’ generationSlide17

The Pre-State Jewish Community

The absence of discourse on the specific character of the regime in Zionism:More pressing issues at handMost thinkers, statesmen, and implementers of Zionism already had some form of image in mind

An effort to avoid inflaming prior tensions within the collectivity

A need arises for tools and rules for allocations of resources

Ben-Gurion’s letter to

Agudat

Yisrael

becomes cornerstone of political culture and church-state relationsSlide18

Non-separation of State & Religion

The issue of defining Israel’s identity and the source of it’s legitimacy as an immigrant settler stateMajor Supreme Court Rulings-The Case of Benjamin

Shalit

-The Case of Oswald

Rufeisen

The Transfer of State Authority to Religious Institutions in areas of personal status.Slide19

Westernization and Statization

Western Bloc VS. Eastern Bloc?Dominant political party of time defined themselves as socialists- Connection to American Jewry deemed too costly to part with

Finding Legitimization in a Postcolonial Age

Importance of Religious Interpretation of the StateSlide20

The Limits of Democracy in Israel

Limitation of Halachic Rule

Limitation of Jewish Female Citizenship

Limitation of Israeli Citizenship

Ethnic Limitation

Limitation of the Israeli Control SystemSlide21