Diplomatist Magazine Diplomatist August 2018 | Page 38

SPOTLIGHT
that question. It was diffi cult to reach a consensus on choosing
one or perhaps a combination of the above options.
For close to seven years following Dichter’s proposal,
this issue was debated among Israeli lawmakers and the
public. Most of the Jewish parties and their voters supported
the concept of the Nation State Bill but argued over various
versions of the bill. This was not just a government initiative,
as was seen when leading opposition fi gures such as Yair
Lapid and Tzipi Livni proposed their own versions. There
was a consensus among most Jews that there should be a law,
yet bitter arguments arose around the content of such a law.
The majority of Arab lawmakers objected to the concept of a
Jewish and Democratic State and has been openly supporting
a different model for Israel - a state for all of its citizens.
Their argument was that Israel must choose between being
Jewish and being democratic. They stressed it was impossible
to be both.
Before the new law, back in 2002, in one of his famous
rulings, Israeli Supreme Court Chief Justice Aharon Barak,
the man who led the Israeli Constitutional Revolution of the
1990s, defi ned the minimal interpretation of what it means to be
a Jewish State: "What, then are the 'core' characteristics shaping
the minimum defi nition of the State of Israel as a Jewish State?
These characteristics come from the aspects of both Zionism
and heritage. At their center stands the right of every Jew to
immigrate to the State of Israel, where the Jews will constitute
a majority; Hebrew is the offi cial and principal language of
the State and most of its fests and symbols refl ect the national
revival of the Jewish People; the heritage of the Jewish People
is a central component of its religious and cultural legacy".
Former Israeli Supreme Court
Chief Justice Aharon Barak
When one compares the historic Barak ruling to the
Basic Law, there are many similarities. The new Basic Law
declares, “Israel is the historic homeland of the Jewish people
in which the State of I