The grounds of reasonableness have been reduced. It is quite logical that this would happen in an unlikely country like ours, but all the commentary articles explaining the harm that can happen from reducing the cause of reasonableness have been pushed aside. Everyone is preoccupied with the feeling of the destruction of the Third Temple, it is the beginning of the end.
Let me suggest another option - this legislation marks the end of the beginning. The State of Israel was established in a crazy combination. In a kind of miracle it worked and survived and developed, but under the cloak of excitement of the return to Zion after two thousand years of exile, the fact that the state was established crooked was set aside. Without a constitution and with a rapidly drafted Declaration of Independence, who would have the power to deal with the question – Jewish or democratic? First we will establish a state and then we will break our heads. So here we are now, at the height of the heat, breaking our heads.
After the cancellation of the reasonableness - crowds went out to demonstrate in the capital // Photo: Yoni Rikner
All those who fear an impending dictatorship under the guise of democracy have forgotten that we were already in one throughout the 50s and beyond. There were governments that used the Shin Bet to listen to political opponents, who set up a newspaper under the guise to trample on a competing newspaper of regime opponents and critics, whose constitutional bread was the appointment of relatives and the distribution of jobs to our well-being, governments that did terrible cultural coercion and tried to melt all identities together by denying and negating them.
One country, many countries
All the small gaps since then have widened over the years into deep rifts. With a lot of effort, the center managed to maintain the guise that we all live in the same country, when in fact we lived in "other countries" all the time. The legislation exposed the depth of the chasm that separated the United States from Israel.
We were divided into two groups, one first democratic and then (maybe) Jewish, the other first Jewish and then (maybe) democratic. At the moment, the two groups are bickering in the streets passionately, echoing the rifts of the past and not dealing with the future.
It is hard not to appreciate the protesters and the enormous passion with which they sacrificed their time, money and bodily peace for the State of Israel they deserve. But the protest's enormous success in setting the public agenda with no clear goal other than toppling the government was unfortunate. With the marches to Jerusalem, the euphoria reached its peak. It is not clear what the protest leaders sought to achieve, since governments overthrow parliamentary intrigues and plots, or replace them with marches to Jerusalem, waving flags and besieging the Knesset.
It's hard not to appreciate the protesters. A demonstration against the legislation, Photo: AP
The most stabbing moment last night was not the vote, but the smug selfie that followed. Your brother's blood is spilled, and you take a selfie? But this selfie was especially symbolic. For more than this government knows where it is going, it mainly knows against whom it is acting, and this is the crux of the problem – the lack of trust in a government whose only essence is to stick a finger in the eye, to do "against" and whose laws are painted as interested in one sector or another. And that's the problem. Historical correction is not done by duplicating a negative for past injustices.
This smugness is dangerous
If yesterday's day wasn't enough to shake the country, yesterday the ultra-Orthodox brought up the proposed Basic Law: Torah study in order to stick another finger in the eye, examining the first the most painful, the second less, and with the third finger you can no longer see anything. But this smugness of glass comes at a price, and when it breaks, the shrapnel will fly in all directions. Demographically, the ultra-Orthodox and settlers are a minority that needs the mass of traditional votes to form a governing coalition. Until now, most traditionalists have followed the kippah people out of a historic commitment to Judaism before democracy. But traditionalism can include verse tattoos, a mini dress and Kabbalat Shabbat, synagogue and sea, democracy and Judaism together.
Synagogue and sea. Citizens spend time at the beach during Saturday, Photo: Joshua Yosef
To purists it always seemed strange, as traditionally it seemed most natural to me. Anyone who counts on the fact that the traditionalists are in their tallit bag will discover that whoever dares to force the traditionalists to choose a Jew or a democrat will lose them in favor of choosing Israeliness. We can mourn the third home that was actually lost last night, and we can begin to look 25 years ahead and understand that we are facing the fourth and most important quarter of the State of Israel, the quarter in which the headaches fell on the most appropriate generation to understand what is democratic and what is Jewish, and especially how all this reconnects to being Israeli.
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