Throwing Stones In Glass Houses
by There’s a dirty little secret no one likes to discuss in Israel: racism and discrimination. On the whole, you can hear talk of discrimination against Jews, but not discrimination by the European Jews against Russian or Ethiopian Jews. Yesterday Haaretz ran a story about how the courts ordered a white man to pay a black mizrahim woman 18,000 Euros for his outrageous discriminatory behavior.
I kept reading message boards where Jews were calling others “goyim” or “goya”. I didn’t understood the term and wasn’t sure I could find out the translation, so I googled it up. In the end I found the definition on dictionary.com and discovered I fit into the category. I was none too pleased to discover it is a derogatory term that has replaced a slightly more polite “gentile ” (“pagan” and “heathen” are translations I don’t associate my Christian faith with). Of course Christians have been targets of Jewish discrimination, too.
There was at least two well publicized incidents of Jewish attacks on Christians in Israel that I read about in 2006: January and June . There are conflicting accounts of proselytizing, but that is no reason to become violent. There are laws against such activities, and if they were offended or felt these Christians had stepped over a legal line, it would’ve been proper to call the police and report the group. If they were in fact innocent, then the police would’ve let the groups go and given them a warning to leave the area.
Some argue Israel , by its very nature, has many racist policies that are the root cause of the problems modern Israel currently faces. It was hard to see the initial reaction after the cease-fire between Israel and Lebanon was called because it mean for Israeli Arabs, they were not going to be compensated at the same rate as Israeli Jews . That decision was nothing more than another collective form of punishment.
Those who are in charge of governing the state, do little better than the bean counters who came up with the lower compensation scheme. “ If we kill civilians, we accept blame, but when you kill civilians, you take credit; it’s a cultural thing. ” What an awful thing for a member of the Knesset to say! I could challenge this statement based upon multiple fiascos, but that’s not my focus. It just goes to show the mindset of the political elite is more comfortable with insults than diplomacy.
Finally, there’s always a waiting slap for the Germans, who could never in their wildest dreams forget what they’ve done, and if by some bizarre chance they did for just a moment, the Israelis would certainly remind them with inflammatory statements:
What has this discrimination achieved? Other than entrenched negative opinions, it has given birth to an exodus from Israel . Many Christian groups do not know the money they are paying to fly Jews home is being wasted as many turn around and go back to their native lands because of the discrimination.
The idea of the regathering seems to be failing, which also means prophecy is not being fulfilled. The Christians technically know there has to be a regathering into the land before certain events take place, and by discrimination pushing immigrant Jews out, they are creating a prophetic problem most Christians have no concept exists.
I can remember my dad having a little nameplate style plaque with a simple sentence on it. “I don’t discriminate. I hate everyone.” I am thankful there are open minded and kind Jews amongst the Israeli population who are trying to make a change in societal thinking, uphill battle or not. These people have a hard job, but it’s one worth fighting and doing right the first time; there are no second chances in fighting discrimination.
quazen.com articles by this writer can be found here
socyberty.com articles can be located here
relijournal.com articles are here
picable.com photographic images are here here
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