Can you provide an example of what restrictions non-Jewish Israeli citizens have? Because I’m pretty sure all Israeli citizens have the same rights (Al Aqsa mosque and other religious sites notwithstanding).
TFA is in practice an example, no? An Arab Israeli cannot marry and live with an Arab from occupied territory just "next door" (their affinity group), but a Jewish Israeli can marry from their affinity group and live anywhere (laws on marriage within Israel are restrictive and often prevent even Jews from marrying other Jews if they are not deemed officially Jewish, I think through matrilinear heredity, but if you are Jewish you can freely travel and marry outside the state and travel back to Israel and have the marriage legally recognized in full).
You might argue that technically this is targeting non-citzens and is therefore not affecting Israeli citizens of any nationality. But to me this is clearly targeted at limiting the normal actions of one group of citizens, while there are other laws to expand and accelerate analogous actions by another group of citizens. There are tens of thousands of Arab Israelis who have been married to non-Israeli Palestinians since 2003 when this law first went into place (the new law is just a law that regularizes a "temporary" "security" law that was renewed yearly until it surprisingly did not get support for yearly renewal in 2021). Those tens of thousands of families are in a very precarious situation, with a spouse with very limited rights to movement, and no rights at all if their Israeli citizen spouse were to die, etc. -- they would be deported (and I believe many have been).
Edit: Israel's interior minister has referred to the law's purpose in a way that shows the purpose is also to discriminate against the Arab Israelis and their ability to get married and have a normal family life: "we don’t need to mince words, the law also has demographic reasons": https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/shaked-family-unificatio...
As for more specific and direct examples, it is legal for the Jewish National Fund to refuse to sell or lease land to non-Jewish national Israelis (i.e., mostly Arab Israelis). The JNF is not public, but it owns a substantial percentage of Israeli land, about 13%, and I don't have information to hand, but I believe there are other bodies with similar practices that administer the majority of Israeli land in this way -- that's a hazy memory though, and I don't have time to research it again, so I wouldn't rely on it.
The Admissions Committees Law also allows for town committees to deny the right of Israelis to buy/lease land/property if they are deemed "unsuitable to the social life of the community [...] or the social and cultural fabric of the town", and allows for the cultural fabric of the town to be based on "special characteristics", such as defining themselves as having a "Zionist vision". This further means non-Zionist citizens are barred -- of course, many Jews in the world are non-Zionist or even anti-Zionist, but I don't think it's jumping to conclusions to infer based on the cultural backdrop that this is primarily a means to exclude non-Jewish nationals.
I think those two are specific examples of "legal" discrimination directly on the basis of non-Jewish nationality.
Ah, those are nice examples, but... some 50% of private land in Israel is owned by Arab Israeli citizens, not by JNF, and they apply similar restriction on any Jewish family trying to settle in a predominantly Arab town or village. A similar restriction doesn't apply to predominantly Jewish towns, only to small community villages.
I'm curious if you have any references, because as you can imagine, it's hard to search for such things.
I tried to make my statements and figures based on objectively verifiable information (the stated policy of JNF and its land holdings, naming the Admissions Committees Law). I think if you were to account for the broader discrimination in property sale/leasing, the amount of land where non-Jewish nationals are denied would be much higher than 13%, never mind counting the colonies in the occupied territories.
I would agree with you if you were saying that petty discrimination (done by individual land-owners) is widespread against all "nationalities", but the issue is that entire neighborhoods, communities, and territories have official sanction and support to be discriminatory against non-Jewish nationalities. And if you believe as I do that Israel must retreat to its border as defined by international law, and that it has in fact done the opposite and engaged in literal colonization for 60 years or so, then it would be plain to see why much of this conversation is besides the point. Of course there will be petty discrimination, perhaps even rooted in each side's belief that each property transaction is really a territorial battle. The actions of consequence are those of the state and those backed by the state apparatus.
>Currently, in Israel “proper” (within the Green Line), only 7 percent of the land is owned privately by individuals (3 percent Jews and 4 percent Arabs). According to the Israeli NGO Regavim, the rest is owned by the Jewish state (80 percent) and the Jewish National Fund (13 percent)
Thanks, but those figures weren't what I was asking about -- I do believe in their accuracy, and used a similar breakdown when writing my comment. I meant regarding the following:
> [Arab Israeli citizens owning private land] apply similar restriction on any Jewish family trying to settle in a predominantly Arab town or village. A similar restriction doesn't apply to predominantly Jewish towns, only to small community villages.
I'm not sure, because you clearly make a distinction between towns and small community villages, so I could be wrong, but it sounds like even there you are describing the (probably rampant) petty discrimination by individuals on 4% of the land. My default is also to assume there are comparable levels of petty discrimination on the other 3% of private land, unless you have some reference to support your comments about restrictions only applying in the other direction.
To repeat another point though, I am highlighting the rigidly enforced discrimination on at least 13% of the land, and think this is far more significant than haphazard petty discrimination on either side of the 4% and 3% private land divide, where creating or buttressing homogenous communities is far harder without state support (though one side does have that). Never mind that, like I said I don't have time to research it now, but I think a substantial portion of that 80% of state land has similar restrictions in place against non-Jewish nationals.
As I said:
> Of course there will be petty discrimination, perhaps even rooted in each side's belief that each property transaction is really a territorial battle. The actions of consequence are those of the state and those backed by the state apparatus.
To make clear the reasons for this:
- they cover a far greater proportion of the land
- they are far more rigidly enforced
- their power to engineer demography is far greater, as the instruments at their disposal are far more powerful (punitive travel/work restrictions, evictions, municipal infrastructure support/denial, military support/harassment, etc.)
The reason I make a distinction between towns and small villages is because Israeli laws only allow committee-based exclusion in small villages. Grow to the size of a town and anyone can move in (buying via third party if one is afraid of discrimination, if necessary). It would only face "petty discrimination" if it moves into a radical religious neighbourhood, but then the same would happen to a non-religious Jewish family.
However, if a Jewish family tries to move into a predominantly Arab town, it will be pushed out even if legally there is no exclusion. Yes, by illegal means if necessary. The petty discrimination levels are different in those two cases.
Regardless of the above, the majority of Israeli population (92%) lives in large cities, where every citizen can buy an apartment, and in most cases the construction companies are not allowed to discriminate at all.
You might argue that technically this is targeting non-citzens and is therefore not affecting Israeli citizens of any nationality. But to me this is clearly targeted at limiting the normal actions of one group of citizens, while there are other laws to expand and accelerate analogous actions by another group of citizens. There are tens of thousands of Arab Israelis who have been married to non-Israeli Palestinians since 2003 when this law first went into place (the new law is just a law that regularizes a "temporary" "security" law that was renewed yearly until it surprisingly did not get support for yearly renewal in 2021). Those tens of thousands of families are in a very precarious situation, with a spouse with very limited rights to movement, and no rights at all if their Israeli citizen spouse were to die, etc. -- they would be deported (and I believe many have been).
Edit: Israel's interior minister has referred to the law's purpose in a way that shows the purpose is also to discriminate against the Arab Israelis and their ability to get married and have a normal family life: "we don’t need to mince words, the law also has demographic reasons": https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/shaked-family-unificatio...
As for more specific and direct examples, it is legal for the Jewish National Fund to refuse to sell or lease land to non-Jewish national Israelis (i.e., mostly Arab Israelis). The JNF is not public, but it owns a substantial percentage of Israeli land, about 13%, and I don't have information to hand, but I believe there are other bodies with similar practices that administer the majority of Israeli land in this way -- that's a hazy memory though, and I don't have time to research it again, so I wouldn't rely on it.
The Admissions Committees Law also allows for town committees to deny the right of Israelis to buy/lease land/property if they are deemed "unsuitable to the social life of the community [...] or the social and cultural fabric of the town", and allows for the cultural fabric of the town to be based on "special characteristics", such as defining themselves as having a "Zionist vision". This further means non-Zionist citizens are barred -- of course, many Jews in the world are non-Zionist or even anti-Zionist, but I don't think it's jumping to conclusions to infer based on the cultural backdrop that this is primarily a means to exclude non-Jewish nationals.
I think those two are specific examples of "legal" discrimination directly on the basis of non-Jewish nationality.