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Reuven Rivlin has proven that he is president of the real Israel
His radical speech to the Herzliya Conference was remarkable, first of all, because it was true: he revealed that something even Israel's politicians refuse to acknowledge.By Asher Schechter | Jun. 9, 2015
On July 24, Reuven Rivlin will mark his first year as Israel’s president. Just three months into his term, in October, he became the first Israeli president to attend a memorial for the 1956 Kafr Qasem massacre, in which Israeli Border Patrol officers shot and killed 47 Israeli Arabs. In the months since, Rivlin has continued to boldly embrace his role as Israel’s collective conscience, defending the rights of Palestinians and of Arab-Israelis and other minorities and speaking out against intolerance, on occasion to the chagrin of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
But this week, speaking at the 2015 Herzliya Conference — a prestigious gathering that has become a centerpiece of Israel’s political calendar — Rivlin may have made his boldest move yet: He told the uncomfortable truth about the country of which he is president. He told its people that the country many of them think they live in does not exist.
Israel, Rivlin said, is fast becoming a tribal state composed of four groups — secular Jews, religious Zionist Jews (also called national religious), ultra-Orthodox (Haredi) Jews and Arabs, all of them fearful, hostile to one another and even to members of their own group. “Today, the first grade classes are composed of about 38 percent secular Jews, about 15 percent national religious, about one quarter Arabs, and close to a quarter Haredim,” Rivlin noted. He said the demographic processes that these numbers represent have “created a ‘new Israeli order’ ... in which there is no longer a clear majority, nor clear minority groups” and consisting of “four principal ‘tribes,’ essentially different from each other, and growing closer in size. Whether we like it or not, the make-up of the ‘stakeholders’ of Israeli society, and of the State of Israel, is changing before our eyes.”
It was a perceptive analysis that has escaped many Israelis, including, as Rivlin noted, many of its leaders.
in full: http://www.haaretz.com/news/israel/1.660417
22 replies
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It's even more funny when people with absolutely no connection to the area whatsoever, not involved in the struggle whatsoever presume they lead the Palestinians.
That's even funnier.
Reminds me of the Mondoweiss crowd such as Alex Kane who tweeted advise to Hamas during the Gaza War to reject the ceasefire. Or the ISM who really want and encourage western tourists of the conflict to lead the Palestinians .
That's even more funny.
From your post :
I find it interesting how often Zionists tell me what Palestinians want
Obama :
The ultimate goal is two states for two people: Israel as a Jewish state and the homeland for the Jewish people and the State of Palestine as the homeland for the Palestinian people -- each state in joined self-determination, mutual recognition, and peace.”
