ADL Head Slams Loyalty Oath For Arab Israelis

[oberliner]

Tel Aviv — A major American Jewish leader has slammed as discriminatory and undemocratic two bills from the party of Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman that are stoking Arab-Jewish tensions.

A panel of government ministers is scheduled on Sunday to vote on introducing a bill to institute a loyalty oath as a precondition for citizenship, a proposal that helped Lieberman’s Yisrael Beitenu party to an unprecedented third place finish in recent elections.

The second bill is slated for a full cabinet vote and would outlaw public expressions of grief over the Palestinian displacement in 1948 — known as Nakba, or catastrophe in Arabic — on Israel’s Independence Day holiday.

Entitled “Loyalty Oath – A Condition for Citizenship,” the draft legislation proposes requiring citizens to declare “loyalty to the state of Israel as a state that is Jewish, Zionist, and democratic, to its symbols and values” and promise to fulfill national service requirements.

http://www.thejewishweek.com/viewArticle/c40_a15900/News/Israel.html

[LeftishBrit]

1. Good - is that likely to have any influence?

[IndianaGreen]

2. A rare kudos from me to Abe Foxman

Sadly, Israel never listens to Diaspora Jews.