http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/...D=5&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y&itemNo=487412 A few weeks ago, a senior Greek Orthodox clergyman in Israel attended a meeting at a government office in Jerusalem's Givat Shaul quarter. When he returned to his car, an elderly man wearing a skullcap came and knocked on the window. When the clergyman let the window down, the passerby spat in his face. The clergyman prefered not to lodge a complaint with the police and told an acquaintance that he was used to being spat at by Jews. Many Jerusalem clergy have been subjected to abuse of this kind. For the most part, they ignore it but sometimes they cannot. On Sunday, a fracas developed when a yeshiva student spat at the cross being carried by the Armenian Archbishop during a procession near the Holy Sepulchre in the Old City. The archbishop's 17th-century cross was broken during the brawl and he slapped the yeshiva student. Both were questioned by police and the yeshiva student will be brought to trial. The Jerusalem District Court has meanwhile banned the student from approaching the Old City for 75 days. But the Armenians are far from satisfied by the police action and say this sort of thing has been going on for years. Archbishop Nourhan Manougian says he expects the education minister to say something. "When there is an attack against Jews anywhere in the world, the Israeli government is incensed, so why when our religion and pride are hurt, don't they take harsher measures?" he asks. According to Daniel Rossing, former adviser to the Religious Affairs Ministry on Christian affairs and director of a Jerusalem center for Christian-Jewish dialogue, there has been an increase in the number of such incidents recently, "as part of a general atmosphere of lack of tolerance in the country." Rossing says there are certain common characeristics from the point of view of time and location to the incidents. He points to the fact that there are more incidents in areas where Jews and Christians mingle, such as the Jewish and Armenian quarters of the Old City and the Jaffa Gate. There are an increased number at certain times of year, such as during the Purim holiday."I know Christians who lock themselves indoors during the entire Purim holiday," he says. Former adviser to the mayor on Christian affairs, Shmuel Evyatar, describes the situation as "a huge disgrace." He says most of the instigators are yeshiva students studying in the Old City who view the Christian religion with disdain. "I'm sure the phenomenon would end as soon as rabbis and well-known educators denounce it. In practice, rabbis of yeshivas ignore or even encourage it," he says. Evyatar says he himself was spat at while walking with a Serbian bishop in the Jewish quarter, near his home. "A group of yeshiva students spat at us and their teacher just stood by and watched." Jerusalem municipal officials said they are aware of the problem but it has to be dealt with by the police. Shmuel Ben-Ruby, the police spokesman, said they had only two complaints from Christians in the past two years. He said that, in both cases, the culprits were caught and punished. He said the police deploy an inordinately high number of patrols and special technology in the Old City and its surroundings in an attempt to keep order.
and yet christians in this country remain the most passionate, outspoken supporters of that violent nation that not only murders children, but also disrespects their religion and has one of the most ridiculous apartheid and racist system in the entire world.
Agreed! :grin: But the government lets the ultra-religious get away with all kind of craziness, like attacking the mayor of Jerusalem. And not much happens, just a slap on the wrist. I can only imagine what would have happened if they were arabs that attacked his car. The same rabbis that run many of these yeshivas also tell soldiers to disobey orders to evacuate settlers, among other things. They also survive completely on tax support and are exempt from the draft. The religious nuts get away with all this, ultimately because they are the spoilng voting block. They are a part of almost any coalition, left or right that gets elected, because they are needed to make a majority in the Knesset. And as they have 10 kids a couple, that demographic will only rise in time. Ain't democracy grand?
That is one of the unfortunate downsides of democracy in Israel. If Israel had been a dictatorship, there is no doubt in my mind that a peaceful resolution to its conflict with the Arab states would have been over a long time ago. Heck, if Israel had a less representative form of democracy, like ours here in the USA, then the peace-wanting majority would have wielded its influence a long time ago. But as is, Israeli democracy is designed to reward sizable minority blocs who tend to advocate one extreme or the other, in the case of Israel that bloc happens to be right wing extremists and the settlements movement.
You do have a point about how in Israel small blocks can block change in the parliament more than traditionally here. However, I do think a sort of neo-con hysteria has gripped Israel and at least for now the majority is for practical purposes an enemy of peace, through its support for expanding settlements and attempting purely military solutions to the Palestinian issue. .
BTW, Christians being spit on Israel is titillating, but it is not important if a few Christians are occasionally spit on, though it is symptomatic of other issues like massive anti-Arab employment discrimination in Israel proper are much bigger issues. Israel desperately needs a Civil Rights Movement. ******** Most Arab women want to work, including a large number of female graduates, but the government has refused to tackle the many and severe obstacles that have been put in their way,” said Sawsan Shukha of Women Against Violence, a Nazareth-based organisation. That assessment was supported by a survey this month revealing that 83 per cent of Israeli businesses in the main professions – including advertising, law, banking, accountancy and the media – admitted being opposed to hiring Arab graduates, whether men or women. Yousef Jabareen, an urban planner at the Technion technical university in Haifa, who has conducted one of the largest surveys on Arab women’s employment in Israel, said the problems Arab women faced were unique. “In Israel they face a double discrimination, both because they are women and because they are Arabs,” he said. “The average in the Arab world [for female employment] is about 40 per cent. Only women in Gaza, the West Bank and Iraq -- where there are exceptional circumstances -- have lower rates of employment than Arab women in Israel. That gap needs explaining and the answers aren’t to be found where the minister is looking.” He said a wide range of factors hold Arab women back, many of them the result of discriminatory policies by successive governments to prevent the 1.3-million Arab minority, which comprises one-fifth of Israel’s population, from benefiting from economic development. http://counterpunch.org/cook11302009.html
Would you hire someone to your company if you thought they may hate your country and your religion but you couldn't ask them? There's too much of a barrier at present. Most of it is mental, so it will wash away, but at the moment I can see why this is happening. I can only imagine the kind of things Israelis hear while growing up regarding Palestinians. Until there's more contact, hearing is believing. I think that is the main reason why there are stakeholders on both sides trying to keep that disconnection intact (sp?). It helps them gather support for idiotic actions.
