#Israël reconnaît la #nationalité “araméenne”
▻http://www.i24news.tv/fr/actu/israel/societe/44138-140917-israel-reconnait-la-nationalite-arameenne
#Israel goes back 4,000 years in ’attempt to divide and rule’ its Arab minority
▻http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/israel-goes-back-4000-years-in-attempt-to-divide-and-rule-its-arab-mi
The Interior Minister, Gideon Saar, signed an order earlier this week that will enable those who identify themselves as Christian descendants of the ancient Aramean people – who originated in what is now modern Syria – to register as Arameans rather than as Arabs, as has been the practice. Media reports, which could not be confirmed, estimated that 200 families in Israel would be affected.
Judging from the pronouncements of Shadi Halul, chairman of the Aramean Christian Society in Israel, relations between Arabs and Arameans have not always been positive.
He highlighted the 8th-century Arab-Islamic conquest in the region as a negative turning point for Arameans. “Arabic language was imposed on us but that doesn’t mean we became Arabs,” Mr Halul told The Independent. “We are not the same nation. The important thing is that now we will not have imposed on us an identity that isn’t related to us, Israel has done justice to the Aramean people.”
Mr Halul said he had been trying for seven years to get the ministry to endorse the nationality. For Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, making a new nation – at least bureaucratically – dovetails with his government’s recent efforts to treat Christians as separate from Muslims, for example by encouraging them to do military service. Mr Halul is a member of a committee that promotes military service for Christians.