Over the past several decades, most of the political elements in this country have joined together in an all-out war against “Israeliness” – Jewish democrats, the Jewish right, messianic nationalists, ultra-Orthodox, Arabs, “new-age” spiritualists – all have successfully fought against the Israeli state identity as a common identity, leaving each group within its self-defined identity, at odds with the other groups.
But daily life in Israel has once again raised the need for a common Israeli spirit that can carry us all toward a promising future. The time has come to formulate Israeliness as the means for its constitutional establishment and its broad goals.
In 1948, we gathered from the four corners of the earth for an inspiring pioneering enterprise that seemed to be a miracle of history. Immigrants from East and West came to Israel and, together with its Arab citizens, worked to rebuild the state.
They built the magnificent edifice of Israeliness out of nowhere, replete with extraordinary achievements – absorbing masses of Jewish refugees, building new cities, towns and villages, developing advanced agriculture, establishing innovative industry, establishing a strong army, and inventing magnificent technologies – all expressions of Israel’s creative power, vitality and excellence.
Above all, a state was established with national institutions that sought to organize the public space in the common structure in which we all live.
In the rush to its establishment, the builders of the state did not deal with the foundations of the “common house,” its growing number of tenants and the rules required for living together. The state that was established under the pressure of the moment was built on the basis of temporary arrangements.
Over the years, a patchwork of temporary solutions has been applied to the common house. After more than 70 years, the temporary solutions no longer work.
Frightened Israelis have lost faith in the rickety structure. At the root of the historic crisis in which we are trapped is the “mother of all problems” – disagreement over the rules of the game.
Entire groups announce that they have not agreed and will not agree to a structured order that makes the state not theirs – Arabs do not agree with the national identity of the state; Mizrahim do not agree with the division of labor and property; haredim do not agree to take part in the maintenance of the building; messianic nationalists prevent the determination of the necessary borders of the state; and proponents of an old order seek to preserve old arrangements that express distributive injustice.
The lack of trust
THE LACK of trust in the shared building and its occupants has led to a politics of identity and resentment that dismantled the mosaic of Israelis who together, made up the image of the state.
In times of constitutional crisis, identity crisis and social crisis, a patchwork solution will not be stable and will not last in the coming years. The compromises currently being worked on at the President’s Residence will not lead to the desired solution.
There is a need for a thorough and comprehensive treatment to reveal Israel’s structural problems; from here, we can get started. We will set out on the road to regulating the existing chaos and walk together to a new area of possibilities, one that will take into account, first and foremost, our being Israelis in the state of the Israeli people.
The historic hour for the State of Israel and its citizens has arrived. Our generation has the historic task of completing Israel’s Declaration of Independence with an Israeli charter. We must decide together on basic questions and establish a new order based on a new framework of thought – an Israeliness shared by all of us.
To this end, the Institute for Israeli Thought has formulated an Israeli charter with the aim of establishing a state based on a common civic identity – Israeliness – and on the principle that the citizens of Israel are sovereign in their state; a state based on the values of equality, human dignity, justice and freedom, distributive justice and social rights, fairness and integrity, with a sense of brotherhood and the shared destiny of the citizens of the Israeli state.
The writer is the head of the Institute for Israeli Thought. On April 23, the institute will hold an annual conference at the ZOA House in Tel Aviv, where the Israeli Charter authored by the institute’s fellows will be presented.