Israeli series exposes raw wounds from ethnic Jewish divide - The Washington Post
▻https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/israeli-series-exposes-raw-wounds-from-ethnic-jewish-divide/2018/04/17/8fdd9bf6-4206-11e8-b2dc-b0a403e4720a_story.html
An electrifying new documentary series on the problematic integration of Middle Eastern Jews by Israel’s European founders in the 1950s has reopened old wounds of an ethnic divide within Judaism ahead of the country’s 70th anniversary festivities.
While Israel is marking the anniversary by highlighting its prosperity and successes, the country is still wrestling with divisions — and not only between Jews and Arabs. For Zionists who view the Jews as a people no less than a religion, the intra-Jewish rift is especially painful.
“The Ancestral Sin” has ignited outrage and disbelief by arguing that the immigrants were systematically marginalized by seemingly bigoted bureaucrats. The controversy has exposed just how raw sentiments are about the history of relations between Mizrahi Jews, from the Middle East and North Africa, and those from Europe, known as Ashkenazim.
“This was a state that directed their fate without including them at all, while deceiving them and imposing its policies on them,” said David Deri, the director. “To this day, society hasn’t really dealt very deeply with these people and places.”
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Tensions have diminished over time. Marriages between Mizrahi and Ashkenazi Jews are common, and Jews of Mizrahi descent have risen to the highest echelons of the government, military, judiciary and entertainment business.
But gaps remain. There has never been a Mizrahi prime minister, for example. Mizrahim far outnumber Ashkenazim in prison, and are far outnumbered in academia. Ashkenazi men earn more than Mizrahim, according to the Adva Center, a think-tank, although less so than in the past.
The series has ramped up an internal Mizrahi debate over how to address past grievances. While many Mizrahim feel their narrative has been shut out, others willingly distanced themselves from their Middle Eastern roots upon arrival. Those efforts often morphed into anti-Arab sentiment and support for the Likud’s hard-line toward the Palestinians.