Meretz, Joint List attempt to repeal Nation-State Law defeated
Blue and White pledged to amend the controversial 2018 law to include explicit guarantees of equality, but the party declined to repeal the law outright in Wednesday’s vote
By JEREMY SHARONIsraeli flag(photo credit: REUTERS)
A long-shot effort by Meretz and Joint List MKs to repeal the controversial Nation-State Law was soundly defeated on Wednesday, as the proponents of the abolition of the 2018 legislation decried what they described as its inherent racism.The Nation-State Law passed by the previous government as a Basic Law was heavy criticized from several quarters, with opponents arguing that because the law talks specifically about Jewish national rights and symbols, including the importance of “Jewish settlement,” the omission of language regarding democracy and equality of all citizens would endanger the rights of non-Jews.The Druze community in particular objected to the law, which it felt excluded them from being part of the state, and with its leaders arguing that it reduces them to second-class citizens and ignores their contribution to the country.Advocates of the bill argued that equality for all citizens is legislated in Israel’s Basic Law: human dignity and freedom, while there had been no previous law delineating Israel’s Jewish character.During the election campaign, the Blue and White Party pledged to amend the law to include explicit language guaranteeing the equal rights of non-Jews while preserving the clause asserting the State of Israel’s status as the nation state of the Jewish people where it exercises self-determination.Meretz and the Joint List rejected this compromise, however, and on Wednesday sought to repeal the law through three different pieces of legislation, all of which were defeated by 50 votes to 18 and 51 to 19.Meretz MK Tamar Zandberg, who advanced one of the bills defeated on Wednesday, said before the vote in the Knesset plenum that the Nation-State Law “belongs on the trash heap of history,” and that it “officially anchored racism and discrimination,” in a basic law.“After two years, it is clear that the entire purpose of the law was to stick a finger in the eye of minorities, which it succeeded in doing,” said Zandberg.She noted that Blue and White had promised to amend the law and challenged its MKs to back the repeal of the law in the absence of any effort to make such amendments, although her entreaties fell on deaf ears, with the legislation being easily defeated.MK Sondos Saleh of the Joint List denounced the Nation-State Law after the bill to repeal it was voted down, saying the Knesset had “declared the natural right of the Jewish people to be an occupier of all nations.”
