"By definition the state of Israel was founded as a Jewish state. The regime constituted in it is democratic in character, but its essence is Jewish. And if there is a contradiction between this essence and the character of the government, it is clear that the essence takes precedence, and that steps are to be taken to prevent damage or changes to this Jewish essence. Democracy cannot to be exploited to destroy the Jewish state."

En Français, ça donne grosso modo ceci :

Par définition, l'état d'Israël a été fondé en tant qu'état juif. Le régime qu'on y a constitué est par caractère démocratique, mais par essence, juif. Et si il y a une contradiction entre cette essence et le caractère du régime, il est clair que l'essence doit avoir préséance, et que des mesures doivent être prises pour éviter que l'on endommage ou change cette essence juive. La démocratie ne peut pas être utilisée pour détruire l'état juif.

C'est dans Haaretz aujourd'hui, sous la plume d'un dénommé Noam Arnon, présenté comme un porte-parole de la communauté juive d'Hébron.

Je ne commente pas. Je constate que le caractère démocratique de l'état d'Israël peut-être ouvertement remis en cause. Je constate qu'il y a deux systèmes de valeurs en présence, et que ces deux systèmes peuvent entrer en conflit.

Ce que je voudrais que tout lecteur de cette chronique comprenne, c'est que toutes les positions israéliennes doivent, pour être comprises, être séparées de "notre" système de valeurs, et doivent être lues à travers la complexité de la coexistence des valeurs du Judaïsme - et/ou du sionisme - et de celles de la démocratie à l'occidentale que nous connaissons.

Toute interprétation qui oublierait ceci serait simplificatrice. Et nous ne pouvons pas nous permettre de simplifier à l'extrème les positions israéliennes.

Plus bas, l'intégralité de l'article en anglais.

It's ours without a majority By Noam Arnon
Major General Uzi Dayan's forecast that the Jewish majority in Israel will be eroded within 18 years was received by the left wing like a parched traveler in the desert welcomes cold water. After all the left's idyllic predictions and illusions about a new Middle East vanished in a smoke cloud of terror, members of this camp needed to find some reason to warrant giving parts of Eretz Israel to Arafat and his cohorts.

And now they've got it - a demographic demon threatens us. We're about to lose a Jewish majority. If we don't give Judea and Samaria away immediately, the Arabs will become a majority between the Jordan River and the sea, and "the state of Israel will lose its Jewish character."

By now, experience and common sense should have taught us to disbelieve absolutely everything preached by the architects of the Oslo process. Everything they've brought us up to now has turned out to be a colossal tragedy. All of their forecasts have been fateful mistakes. But when the forecast in question is "scientific," there are liable to be those who relate to its estimates as facts, and include the prediction as a component in their line of reasoning.

First, "demographic facts" should be treated with outright skepticism. Such warnings have been issued in the past, and have mostly proved false. The percentage of Arabs in Israel has not grown significantly in recent decades - but I want to address this question from a very different angle.

For a well-rooted Jew living in Eretz Israel by dint of historic right, the issue raised by Dayan does not constitute a problem. Our right to Eretz Israel and our right to establish a sovereign national entity on it does not depend on our numbers, and on whether we are a majority or a minority. This land was our country when we were a small, isolated minority.

Five hundred or a thousand years ago, a few thousand Jews lived in the country. In 1919, the League of Nations recognized the Jewish people's right to the land, without any connection to their number in it (tens of thousands). In 1948, 600,000 Jews lived in the country. The numerical issue was never brought up as an element determining the Jewish people's connection to or belonging in the country.

Hence, for us it doesn't matter whether there are more Jews or Arabs here. Of course, we would prefer it if there are a majority of Jews here. But no matter, the Jewish people will retain their right to the country.

By definition the state of Israel was founded as a Jewish state. The regime constituted in it is democratic in character, but its essence is Jewish. And if there is a contradiction between this essence and the character of the government, it is clear that the essence takes precedence, and that steps are to be taken to prevent damage or changes to this Jewish essence. Democracy cannot to be exploited to destroy the Jewish state.

Legislators should settle this point in clear, categorical terms, without any qualms of conscience or moral compunction. Absolute justice holds that the state of Israel is, and has always been, the only Jewish state, and this country has been solely that of the Jewish people. That's how things have been defined, and that's how they will remain. Whoever wants a different state should look for it somewhere else.

The strange and disturbing thing is that those who identify with the state of Israel as a democracy bound to human rights do their utmost to prevent the Jewish majority from guaranteeing its rights and numerical advantage. They raise small families (if they have children at all); they prevent any measure giving preference to the growth of the Jewish population and rebuilding it after the Holocaust; they fight against encouraging Jewish births and support for army veterans; they campaign to give settlement rights to Arabs in Jewish communities.

In educational and cultural spheres the democracy addicts - who are so worried about the "Jewish character of the state of Israel" - destroy the Jewish infrastructure of the school system, weaken Jewish identity and expressions of this identity in the media and in public life, encourage assimilation and the eradication of the Jewish demographic basis of the state.

In short, these are the people doing their utmost to promote their forecast of a lost Jewish majority.

In order to preserve what they call the "character of the state," they add insult to injury, and preach about the need to give the enemy the heart of the historic Jewish homeland, and wipe out Jewish biblical roots. Simultaneously, they fight against every authentic, contemporary expression of Jewishness in the state of Israel, starting with Shabbat, and continuing with education, culture, kashrut, stopping profligate sexuality, and more.

It is those to whom a Jewish majority isn't critical that are strengthening the Jewish demographic future.

They are the ones who have large families, who provide a strong Jewish education to their children which cultivates a clear sense of Jewish identity and belonging. They guarantee that their children will perpetuate their Jewish heritage. It is because of them that the "visionaries of democracy" will continue to live in a Jewish state and amuse themselves tossing about their inane ideas.

The writer is a spokesman of the Hebron Jewish Community
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=202233&contrassID=2&subContrassID=4&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y

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