One of the joys of a world seized by identity politics is that everyone wants to let you know their self-identification: Israel identifies as a Jewish state and has passed a Basic Law explicitly saying so.
The law is, as a millennial might say, problematic, even if most of it is uncontroversial. It defines the name, flag, emblem and anthem of the state. The Hebrew calendar will still be the official calendar and Yom Ha’atzmaut will continue to be the annual national holiday. Jews will go on having the right to observe Saturday as their day of rest and non-Jews to observe their day of rest. Clause five recommits the state to promoting Jewish immigration while clause seven defines Jewish settlement as ‘a national value’ and says that Israel ‘will labour to encourage and promote its establishment and development’. These twin principles are nothing new: the right of Jews to migrate to and settle the Land of Israel has been recognised in international law since the League of Nations’s 1922 mandate for Palestine.
So what is the trouble with the Nation-State law? The answer lies in clause 1(c) which reads:
‘The actualisation of the right of national self-determination in the state of Israel is unique to the Jewish people.’
That has been misread to mean only Jews have a right to self-determination in Israel.
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