
Israel is no stranger to criticism. Both within our country and outside of it, there is no shortage of opportunity to debate and disagree. Recently, even many outsiders who claim to love Israel have taken to criticizing it. In these very pages, Ronald Lauder, the president of the World Jewish Congress, wrote recently about his concerns about what is happening to Israel, apparently reflecting the worries of others in the Jewish diaspora when he suggests that Israel is somehow too Jewish or that its democracy is under threat.
So let me be clear: We Israelis are proud of who we are. We are proud of our Jewish traditions and identity, and we are proud of the equality and freedoms for all our people.
As minister of education and a previous minister of the economy, I can attest to our efforts to ensure equality in education, academia and employment for Israel’s Arab communities. The Ministry of Education has found a year-on-year increases in Arab students graduating from high school, with around 63 percent of all Arab students completing their studies — just a few points below the national average of 68 percent. These figures are expected to rise even further over the next five years. We have seen an increase in employment for Arab women.
But at the same time, there is no denying that Israel is a Jewish state. This is why last month our government passed the Nation State Law, which reaffirms the centrality of the Jewish identity and nature of the state of Israel. This law now sits proudly alongside Israel’s other Basic Laws (which carry quasi-constitutional power) that reinforce the freedom of expression and equality for all citizens of Israel. Our self-identification as a Jewish homeland will never change. It is a central tenet of Zionism.
Of course, we still recognize the important contribution of our minority communities. The Druze, many of whom serve in the Israeli military, want to see their community officially recognized by Israel and to have the special relationship with the Jewish state affirmed. They are right to point out that this relationship was not referenced by the Nation State Law. I am proud to have led the calls for this to be rectified — by means other than changing the law passed.
What many of the Nation State Law’s critics fail to recognize is that its passage comes only after decades of successive rulings by Israel’s judiciary that have ignored the aspirations of those who seek to preserve the Jewish nature of our state. Our Supreme Court has based its rulings in numerous cases — on issues such as immigration and the extension of Israeli citizenship to Palestinians — on the existing Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty, much to the dismay and despair of many in Israel and abroad who saw these rulings as a direct attack on Israel’s Jewish character. The Nation State Law seeks to balance the scales and ensure that these concerns are considered.
Some critics of the law, as Mr. Lauder suggested, seem to believe that a law defining Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people could somehow amount to a threat to the Jewish people. They argue bizarrely that somehow the addition of such a law to Israel’s robust judicial system, and political checks and balances, poses a threat to the future of the Jewish people, and to Jews the world over. This is at once audacious and preposterous.
While I normally would happily respect the views of Jews all over the world — as different or as similar as they may be to my own — on this claim I cannot remain silent. Keeping Israel as the Jewish nation-state does not threaten the future of the Jewish people; it safeguards it. Protecting Jewish traditions, just as they safeguarded our people through two millenniums of exile, is the only way to be sure that Israel can continue to be a strong and vibrant democracy in a very difficult region.
Indeed, the threat to the future of the Jewish people, what really keeps me up at night, is the mass assimilation of American Jews. This is not happening among the Orthodox communities. Research clearly shows the statistical decline among the non-Orthodox, unaffiliated Jews. Year after year, census after census, generation after generation they disappear. This is what threatens the Jewish people. They are deserting their Jewish roots, but not because of political frustration or a lack of love for a country thousands of miles away.
As minister of diaspora affairs, I have endeavored to strengthen the bonds between the Jewish community abroad and the state of Israel. With huge levels of Israeli investment in outreach programs, we have aided and assisted countless projects to help connect with Jews, both active and unaffiliated members of the community, to help them learn more about Israel — and in turn to help Israelis learn more about them.
There may be many disagreements between us, but this is something we are proud of. True democracy is not about unanimity; it is about consensus and debate that considers all views but that ultimately is based on the will of a majority. And this is what Zionism truly is. Jewish self-determination: democratic, sovereign and upholding the rule of law in our homeland.
Israel is an amazing country that boasts stability, prosperity and freedom. We are not perfect. But we try to be good and do good. While I welcome the concern of our Jewish brethren, alongside many friends of Israel around the world, and while I have full faith in their love for Israel and the Jewish people, I would urge all to remember that disagreement isn’t dangerous. But what damages us is when we forget what binds us together, what would happen if we were to or run away or turn our backs to one another. And Israel will never turn its back on its brothers and sisters around the world.
Naftali Bennett is Israel’s minister of education, minister of diaspora affairs and the leader of the Jewish Home Party.