PS, motherfucker...
Israels elections are a model of the democratic process. While the United States has only two major parties that are often criticized for being too similar, Israeli voters typically have more than a dozen parties to choose from, representing a wide variety of political views. In the last election, 13 parties won seats in the Knesset, including three Arab parties with eight representatives.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/talking/36_liberal.html
"The key to AIPAC's success is support for the only Western democracy in the Middle East," said Josh Block, spokesman for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which boasts over 65,000 Jewish and non-Jewish members. "The members support and believe that Israel is our ally on the frontline against terrorism in the Middle East. When you are lobbying on an issue that is so clearly the right thing to do, your effectiveness is high."
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,53785,00.html
The National Review (
www.nationalreview.com) has published an excellent article from Victor Davis Hanson
on how the United States, Israel and most western Democracies (not France) are winning the war on Islamic terrorism:
http://www.factsofisrael.com/blog/archives/000711-print.html
But what exactly does "Western standards" mean? Here we come to complication No. 2. There is not a single Western standard, there are two: what we demand of Western countries at peace and what we demand of Western countries at war. It strains not just fairness but also logic to ask Israel, which has known only war for its 40 years' existence, to act like a Western country at peace.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,969475-2,00.html
Survey: Israel yet to grasp concept of democracy
By Mazal Mualem
More than half the Jewish population of Israel - 53 percent - is opposed to full equal rights for Israeli Arabs, according to a survey conducted last month by the Israel Democracy Institute.
The general conclusion of the survey, which is dubbed the "Israeli Democracy Survey" and will be conducted every year, is that Israel is basically a democracy in form more than in substance, and that it has yet to internalize fully the concept of democracy.
In examining various indicators concerning the state of democracy in the country, the survey takes into consideration various polls and comparisons with other democracies, and also measures changes in Israeli society over time, using both existing data and research conducted for this specific purpose. The results of the survey - conducted among 1,208 adults representing all sectors of Israel's population - will be announced next Thursday at a conference at the President's Residence in Jerusalem.
The survey focused on institutions, human rights and stability, and social cohesiveness. Each of these three elements were measured according to several indicators; a total of 31 indicators relating to the state of democracy in Israel were used.
The current survey discovered the lowest support in the last 20 years for the assertion that democracy is the best form of governance: Only 77 percent of the respondents supported this premise - as compared to 90 percent in 1999. Israel is also one of the only four countries of the 32 listed in the study, in which most of the public believes that "strong leaders can do more for the country than debates or legislation."
Prof. Asher Arian and Prof. David Nachmias, who conducted the survey, say that Israeli democracy is particularly vulnerable today because of the occupation, the intifada and the war on terror. Consequently, Israel scores relatively low on human rights and freedom of the press, which they say should be a warning sign. On freedom of the press, Israel scored 70 out of 100 - the minimum requirement for the press to be considered free. One of the reasons attributed to the dip in Israel's rating in this area, from 72 points in the mid-1990s, is the attitude of the authorities toward the foreign press since the onset of the intifada. In this respect, Israel is ahead of only Romania, South Africa, Argentina, Mexico and India.
Concerning discrimination against minorities, Israel scored 3 on a scale of 0-4, and thus belongs to the bottom third of the 28 countries covered in the survey. In human rights violations, Israel (including the territories) also scores very high, leading the list together with South Africa.
The only parameter in which Israel scored highest in a positive way regards the extent that political competition is open to everyone and enables governmental change. But the flipside of this achievement is frequent changes in the government and deep social rifts, reflecting instability and lack of social cohesiveness, according to the survey. Of 26 countries, only India beat Israel in terms of social gaps. Israel and Argentina share first place in the frequency of changes in governments - five in 10 years - and thus also share first place in terms of instability.
On the institutional front, Israel scored fairly well. It ranked sixth of 36 countries in terms of representativeness and political balance, but was only 22nd in terms of voter turnout, with a 68 percent turnout in 2003 elections as compared to 77 percent in 1996, for example. Distrust between individuals also ranked high compared to other countries.
A nonprofit organization, the Israel Democracy Institute aims to promote structural, political and economic reforms, to provide information and comparative research for the Knesset and government authorities, to serve as an advisory body for decision-makers and the general public, and to encourage public discourse about issues on the national agenda
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=293813
But now, with a round of Knesset elections three weeks away, Israel has much less reason for pride.
While Mr. Kahane's successor, Baruch Marzel, was allowed to run for office as the No. 2 candidate for another extreme rightist party, the two most prominent Arab legislators in the outgoing Knesset, Ahmed Tibi and Azmi Bishara, were barred by the Central Election Committee last week.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C01E0DC1F3FF935A35752C0A9659C8B63
Democracy or hypocrisy
By Haaretz Editorial
Tags: Yitzhak Rabin, Palestinians
Every year on the anniversary of Yitzhak Rabin's assassination the religious camp feels persecuted and shunned, and in its feeling of collective guilt it turns on the left, the secular community, the media and the Rabin family - as if they have all come together to perpetuate the shame. The other camp, whose boundaries also shift and sharpen on the assassination's anniversary, sees the multiplicity of statements by the religious camp as a sign that the feeling of collective guilt has been internalized.
The desire to distinguish itself from the assassin Yigal Amir and what he represents is encouraging. Since the murder, the settler leadership has also become divided between the more and less extreme, with the latter prepared to agree to withdrawal in exchange for peace and the Oslo borders, the same borders that sent the right to demonstrate at Zion Square before Rabin's assassination. It should be remembered, and people should be reminded, that Amir is not insane and that only 15 years ago even the current prime minister, not to mention the previous one, shared Amir's positions on Oslo, although not his actions.
Each year the religious camp comes up with initiatives to commemorate the Rabin assassination. Most propose a national reconciliation and to change the day to "democracy day" to give it a less divisive message. These proposals are part of Israeli society's natural misgivings after the assassination, but there is no reason to accept them. The difference between the two worldviews must be honed, not dulled. If until the assassination Israel mistakenly seemed like a villa in the jungle, a modern and liberal society, on November 4, 1995, it became apparent that the dark clouds of religious-nationalist fundamentalism had not passed us over. Amir was the suicide terrorist of the struggle for the greater Land of Israel, who by chance remained alive.
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A large majority of the Israeli public continues to support leaving the occupied territories in return for a peace agreement. From this point of view, Amir failed resoundingly. The minority that believes the territories must not be left under any circumstances has not grown, but it has become more extreme. It has spread over the hills of Samaria, in the yeshivas, in the preparatory programs and in Orthodox girls' high schools within the Green Line. More people of the religious right live outside the boundaries of the Israeli democracy, physically and psychologically, ardent in their faith that no agreement with the Palestinians will ever come to pass. The demand to create a Jewish consensus before any decision on withdrawal has become a code for refusing to accept any concession, even if it is supported by a large democratic majority.
The police did well to release the tape of Amir's interrogation, and its full text should be studied in civics classes. Amir decided to murder Rabin the moment the Oslo Accords were signed. He was not deterred, but rather imbued with faith in the justness of his cause. Generations of young people must be educated against this faith and cause. Even before he carried out the assassination Amir belonged to the camp that preferred the greater, occupying Land of Israel to the democratic Israel, although he understood that these are two conflicting entities. Many still believe as he does.
Education for democracy must encompass debate about Israel's control over the lives of Palestinians deprived of civil rights; it must relate to the fact that Israeli democracy suffers from an essential flaw. Without discussing these issues on the commemoration day of the assassination, the initiative will not be educational, but hypocritical.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/916344.html
I tellya, NOTHING says joo hating antisemite quite like posted evidence!
Hey, now that I've kicked you in the balls with proof beyond your limp-wristed namecalling you can call me an ANTISEMITE again! that IS how you dealt with the LAST pimp ring imprint I left on your forehead, right?
