Coalition chairman Yariv Levin (Likud Beytenu) is working on a series of measures to legally differentiate Christians and Muslim Arabs.
▻http://www.jpost.com/Diplomacy-and-Politics/Likud-MK-pushes-measures-to-legally-differentiate-Christian-and-Muslim-Arabs-
According to Levin, “this idea came from Christians who asked me to do this following similar activity pertaining to the Druse minority. It’s not surprising that Christians want to be separated from Muslims. This is the only place in the Middle East where they have security and freedom of worship. Many Christians don’t want to be known as Arabs, but as Maronites or Aramites.”
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The coalition chairman asked the Interior Ministry to allow Christians to have “Christian” written as their nationality on their identity cards, as opposed to other Arabs, who have “Arab” written there.
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Balad MK Basel Ghattas, a Christian Arab who also was the co-founder of Adalah, the legal center for Arab minority rights, told The Jerusalem Post that Levin is making “a provocative action,” which “is part of a divide and conquer policy that was used by the Zionist movement and by all colonial states in the world.”
Asked if Arab Christians feel part of the Arab nation, he said they do and that they have roots in Arab culture, which are very strong, and Levin cannot change this.
This move is an attempt to “leverage the situation in the Middle East and the instability where Christians are unsettled,” he said going on to criticize Levin for “cheap propaganda” and using “really marginal groups” within the Israeli Arab Christian community to support him.
Ghattas wrote a strong letter to Levin over the matter, stating that he will fight against the “cynical manipulation,” which is fueled by a “racist ideology.”
Arab Christians are strong enough to face attempts to divide them, he said.
Asked about Christian Arabs that may support Levin’s proposal, he responded that they do not represent them and a campaign against this divide and conquer strategy will take place in the coming months.
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“Levin first should decide who is a Jew and then decide who is an Arab,” Jafar Farah, the director of the Mossawa Center - The Advocacy Center for Arab Citizens in Israel, told The Post.
“Christians always saw themselves as part of the Arab nation” and Levin is “not going to change things now,” he added.
The Abraham Fund panned Levin’s proposals as an attempt to “divide and conquer” Israeli Arabs and took issue with Christians not being identified also as Arabs.
“These practices are being used in order to weaken the minority’s collective identity,” an Abraham Fund spokeswoman said. “This absurd proposal [is] yet another effort to discriminate against Israel’s Muslim Arab citizens by fueling internal tensions within the Arab minority.”
#diviser_pour_mieux_régner #colonialisme #nationalité #Israël
The NGO added that the measures are an attempt to condition benefits for citizens on their refraining from calling themselves Arabs.
Le chemin de croix des chrétiens en Israël
▻http://www.lepoint.fr/monde/le-chemin-de-croix-des-chretiens-en-israel-08-09-2012-1503992_24.php