The protest over the nation-state law seems to center around the absence of a declaration of equality. The law's detractors demand that it include the language introduced in Israel's Declaration of Independence, namely that "The State of Israel will … ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex." This vague wording, they believe, will meet all their demands on the matter.
In one Knesset House Committee meetings on this law, I proposed that Basic Law: The Knesset – not the nation-state law – be amended to include a provision saying that, in addition to the equal right of every citizen to vote and be elected, the state's sovereignty "will be in the hands of all its citizens, regardless of race, religion or gender."
I also suggested that the aspiration for equality could, alternatively, be anchored in Basic Law: The Judiciary.
However, one should remember that laws, in Israel as in the rest of the world, mark differences between citizens on the basis of religion, gender, and nationality. This is true for women's rights, military service and so on.
Unfortunately, my suggestions were rejected.
I have yet to encounter two identical human beings. To my delight, even the advocates of absolute equality share this with me, which is why they so adamantly glorify pluralism and demand total tolerance for the "other" – especially if the latter happens to agree with their positions.
The Druze protest arose in the context of the need for this "absolute equality." This made me revisit the nation-state law, but I could not find so much as a hint to anyone being relegated to a "second-class citizen" or worse, as has been professed by the Druze.
The Druze are our brothers, but one must question the equality between the Druze themselves.
After recalling the harsh fate of the Druze in Syria, the lynching of Druze wounded by Syrian soldiers rescued by the IDF in the summer of 2015, and the widespread use of Syrian flags in Druze demonstrations on the Golan Heights, I took the liberty of reviewing election results in Druze communities.
As expected, significant differences were found between the various townships.
In the northern village of Yarka, for example, 37% of the residents voted for the Joint Arab List, but it Daliyat al-Karmel, only 7% of the Druze supported it.
Voter turnout in Druze communities within the Green Line was 60%, but it dropped significantly in the Golan communities. In Buqata, for example, only 17 people voted (of them, only one voted for the Joint Arab List, five supported Likud and four voted for the Zionist Union). In Majdal Shams, the Likud and the Zionist Union garnered 40 votes each.
This only underscores the fact that no two people are alike and therefore the demand for absolute equality – outside the desire to perpetuate the rule of the legal oligarchy – is far too vague.
It is a shame that those who long for equality did not agree to guarantee it by amending Basic Law: The Knesset as suggested. Perhaps they opposed it because they knew agreeing to it would render their arguments hollow.
