I’ve been reporting on Israel here for two decades. I’ve been through wars and even what I thought might be the outbreak of an inter-ethnic civil war in 2021. But the current crisis is different. It is a deep fissure among the Israeli Jewish ruling elite (with peripheral involvement of the Israeli Palestinian minority). The […]
Kahanist Orthodox Right Seeks to Make Israeli Commerce Arabrein
In Germany, Nazis were proud to empty important segments of society of Jews and make them Judenrein. Ridding the nation of the noxious influence of Judaism became an idée fixe, an obsession and ideological underpinning of the fascist movement. I’ve noted here in the past, most recently with the rabbinic editorial calling for death camps […]
Israeli Chief Rabbi Orders Shop Owners Who Employ Jewish Girls Not to Hire Arabs
I couldn’t have made this up myself if I’d tried: the rabbis of the largely Yemenite city of Rosh Ha-Ayin (English), including the chief rabbi, declared a ban on hiring Arabs at stores which employ Jewish girls. I swear to you, it’s true. If you’d told me this story came out of Pakistan or Kandahar […]
Israeli Rabbis Urge Refusal to Rent to Arabs, Echoing Nuremberg Laws
In a move reminiscent of Nazi-era Nuremberg Race Laws, a group of radical Orthodox rabbis led by the chief rabbi of Tzfat urged fellow Israeli Jews to refuse to rent apartments to non-Jews: Dozens of Israel’s municipal chief rabbis have signed on to a new religious ruling that would forbid the rental of homes to […]
