The U.N. General Assembly resolution that declares Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination has been a controversial issue since its adoption in 1975. A decade afterwards, the issue dominated the Nairobi World Conference on Women and threatened to disrupt the proceedings. Opponents of the resolution continue to argue that Zionism is a liberation movement, providing Jews with an escape from racism, and therefore cannot itself be racist. They contend that to accuse Zionism of racism is an attack on Judaism. They point out that many nations supporting the resolution are themselves racist. Some note that the Soviet Union supported the resolution and it must therefore be wrong. They claim that Arabs in Israel do not suffer discrimination, but rather have profited from Jewish development of the country. They accuse critics of Israel of anti-Semitism and of wanting to destroy the state. They declare that people who have been persecuted, as Jews have been, deserve a special haven in which they are given preferential treatment. They complain that to condemn Zionism is an attempt to prevent Jews from returning to their homeland. Daniel P. Moynihan, who was the representative of the United States to the United Nations when the resolution was adopted, characterizes it as a Soviet anti-Semitic tactic. He emphasizes in a recent book that the United States should have prevented the adoption of the resolution because loyalty to friends should be the prime consideration.¹ These attempts to defend Israel are distractions which sidestep the real issue. The essence of the problem is rarely addressed. It is, simply, whether the ideology of Zionism and the laws of Israel sanction discrimination against non-Jewish citizens of lsrael. If so, is the label of racism applicable to the discrimination?

My argument that "racism" is a valid charge against Zionism is divided into three parts. The first addresses the differences between scientific and popular concepts of race which cause confusion about the meaning of "racism." The second calls attention to strategies that conceal the important distinction in Israeli law between "nationality" and "citizenship." The third discusses the manifold problems that result from the insistence of Zionist spokesmen that nationality and religion are inseparable for Jews.

CONFUSIONS ABOUT RACE AND RACISM

Strictly speaking, "race" is a biological term. But the word "race" is often used in popular parlance to describe a group of people whose bonds to each other are based on factors other than genetic relationships. Terms such as an "English race," a "Jewish race," an "African race" or a "French race," to cite some familiar examples, are therefore incorrect. They imply that a common language, a common religion, residence in the same geographic location or citizenship in one state create racial ties. But only when barriers that have endured for millenia totally separate one group from others do the people develop sufficient genetic similarities among themselves and differences from other populations to constitute a separate race. People have migrated throughout the world for many thousands of years, filling every available niche in many environments. As they migrated, biological mixture occurred. Neither physical differences nor the inability to communicate verbally with each other nor religious nor nationalistic prohibitions against contacts with outsiders have ever prevented the mixing of genes. Not only intermixture, but environmental factors as well, have blurred the boundary lines between races. Numerous studies show that physical characteristics differentiating the races are not biologically fixed, but that climate, nutrition and disease are among the many factors that cause changes from generation to generation.²

There is not an indisputable division of the human species into races, for the selection of distinguishing features and levels of differentiation are arbitrary. The concept of race has therefore proved less useful than it was once regarded to be, as a tool to trace human evolution and human migration, and many anthropologists have discarded it. Those scientists who continue to refer to human races do so primarily to distinguish the major divisions, such as Mongoloid, Caucasoid and Negroid. But unlike popular concepts of the meaning of "race," which tend to confuse biology and culture, scientific use of the term remains strictly biological.

Race studies once dominated the discipline of anthropology, but few anthropologists any longer categorize people racially. Loss of interest in classification was accelerated by abuse of anthropological race classifications to justify discrimination. Many writers who promoted the idea of racial superiority adopted anthropological nomenclature and conveyed the impression that anthropologists approve of an attribution of psychological characteristics to races. They ignored the fact that scientific classifications of race are based strictly on differences in physical characteristics. Also, they attached labels to races that were misrepresented as valid racial terms. "Aryan," which is a linguistic, not a biological term, is the most notorious. Hitler distinguished between Aryans and non-Aryans on the basis of genealogical records although, according to Nazi propaganda, members of the non-Aryan races are supposed to be identifiable by unique physical and psychological features.

The misuse of race classifications to justify eugenic policies and massacre millions of persons mobilized scientists for an attack on the race concept. The anthropologist Ashley Montagu was in the vanguard. Because people have fixed, false ideas about the meaning of "race," he recommended substituting "ethnic group." He reasoned that the substitution would open opportunities for re-education about the nature of group differences and correction of racist attitudes.³ The use of racist ideology for justifying discrimination against minority populations and for disseminating anti-Semitism made it apparent that the evil consequences of the abuse of the race concept had far outweighed its value as a research tool. Many anthropologists joined the assault on misconceptions about race. Anti-Semitism was a particular object of attack. They stressed that Jews do not now, and never did, constitute a race and that intermixture with nonJews resulted in greater resemblances between Jewish and non-Jewish populations living in the same geographic area than exist among various dispersed Jewish populations.⁴ The word "race" itself was condemned, and not only as applied to Jews.

The Statement on Race (1952) by a group of social scientists, issued by UNESCO, follows Montagu's recommendation that "race" be dropped altogether and "ethnic group" used instead to refer to a population that is physically distinguishable from another. The statement pointed out that the biological term "race" conveys the false impression that differences in such cultural characteristics as religion, nationality, language and behavior are innate and unchangeable and therefore become targets of prejudice. The term "ethnic group," on the other hand, implies that these differences are not inborn, but acquired. "Ethnic group" was considered a more appropriate term to express what people often really mean when they talk about race. The rationale motivating efforts to abolish use of the term "race" is that prejudicial feelings will abate if people stop identifying populations with a biological term.

There is a problem with the rationale behind the effort to induce changes in vocabulary as a means of halting prejudice and discrimination. It is wrong to assume that the dominant source of racism is a belief that the characteristics one population denigrates in another originate in the germ plasm. Antagonisms develop toward people whose characteristics are perceived as undesirable, without consideration as to whether the offensive characteristics are inherited from previous generations and will be transferred to the next generation. When racism is politically and economically motivated, differences easily become the focus of animosities that encourage prejudice. Racism flourishes whether or not the oppressor population is, or is alleged to be, racially different from its victims. Unfortunately, efforts to correct popular concepts about race have neither decreased racist attitudes nor clarified the meanings of race and racism.

Much of the confusion about the meaning of "racism" follows from contradictory opinions about the meaning of "race." Many anthropologists today assert that races do not exist. An examination of physical anthropology text books revealed that a no-race view was the most prevalent view by the end of 1970.⁵ This is in part a reaction against the proliferation of classifications that split major human groups into many races without a generally acceptable standard of differentiation and without consideration of the effects of environment on the development of distinctive characteristics.⁶ Anthropologists still refer to "race" but limit it to major human varieties. If one holds that there are many races within each of the several major divisions of mankind, then "racism" correctly applies to discriminatory practices of White against White and Black against Black. But if there are only three major races, then "racism" applies only when Blacks, Whites and Asians discriminate against each other. And if races do not exist, it follows that "racism" cannot exist. With no consensus among anthropologists and popular writers about the meaning of "race," the identification of "racism" similarly becomes imprecise.

The contemporary concept of racism developed out of the Nazi model, assuming three necessary ingredients: (1) a proclamation declaring the majority population to be racially distinct from a minority, (2) a rationalization for discrimination based on theories of racial superiority and (3) a prohibition of intermarriage to prevent the contamination of the racial purity of the allegedly superior group. But these features need not be present in a policy of discrimination. Their inclusion in conceptualizations of racism provides opportunities to conceal discriminatory practices. No spokesperson for an oppressor nation today justifies inequality by appeals either to genetic inferiority or to biological dangers of intermarriage. To do so would neatly conform to the Nazi model and clearly identify the oppressor as racist. Post-World War II policies of discrimination, prejudice and persecution are more subtle. South Africa attempts to justify apartheid laws by arguing that separation contributes to the better development of both Blacks and Whites. "Separate but equal" facilities were long maintained in the United States to evade the integration of Black and White children in classrooms. Until 1970, Israel excluded Ethiopian Jews from the right of immigration that all Jews legally possess on the ground that their Judaism is unauthentic. Britain's immigration restrictions against Asians are motivated, some politicians say, by their difficulties in adjusting to a new culture. Because of the association of racism with Nazi genocide, a charge of "racism" is deflected by pretending benevolent motives for discrimination.

Definitions of "racism" based on the Nazi model contribute to evasions of a charge of racism. For example, a current textbook of genetics defines racism as "the belief in an inherent superiority of some races."⁷ To escape a racist label, therefore, an oppressor need only omit a reference to racial superiority. Israeli laws, for example, discriminate against nonJews. But Israel, by this definition, is not racist because officials do not proclaim, as the Nazis did, that the minority population is inferior to the majority.

Employing the Nazi model further enables discriminatory policies to steer clear of an accusation of racism when victims are not racially distinct from their oppressors. Kraines can therefore say, in defense of Zionism against a charge of racism, that neither the Jews nor Arabs constitute a race.⁸ But Germans and Jews of the Third Reich were also not racially separate, notwithstanding Nazi theories to the contrary. Nonetheless, Nazi persecutions are regarded as the epitome of racism, and anti-Semitism is generally referred to as "racism."

In 1965 the United Nations General Assembly formulated a definition of racial discrimination which stretches the meaning of the term to include discrimination on ethnic as well as biological grounds. It was resolved that "racial discrimination is any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, colour, descent or national or ethnic origin." Adopted by a majority of sufficient size, General Assembly Resolution 2106 qualified as an international convention. It has been ratified by 123 nation states, including Israel.⁹ This definition, which expands "race" beyond its biological context, provides the basis for the 1975 resolution stating that "Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination." In this resolution, "racism" and "racial discrimination" have equivalent meanings. Although redundant, both terms were probably applied because "racism" is unsurpassed as a label of reprobation. Equated with the horrors of the Holocaust, it still has shock value in a world that has become inured to violations of human rights. The strong prolonged reaction to a charge of racism against Israel is proof of its effectiveness.

STRATEGIES OF CONCEALMENT

Israel's eminently successful cover of virtue and humanitarianism to conceal the institutionalized racism of its society is probably unsurpassed anywhere. The term "institutionalized racism" is not being used here to refer to prejudice of one Jewish population against another, which occurs in Israel as it does in other countries. These prejudices within the Jewish community will change with changing political, economic and social climates. The racism that the United Nations resolution refers to is discrimination against non-Jewish citizens that is perpetuated in the "fundamental laws" of the state.

The crucial question for determining the validity of the United Nations resolution is whether the Arabs in Israel are in fact legally discriminated against because they are not Jews. The standard Zionist response is that all persons, whatever their religion, may acquire Israeli citizenship and that both Arab and Jewish Israeli citizens have equal rights. It is true that Arabs in Israel may become Israeli citizens, but Israeli citizenship does not give Arabs the same rights as Jews. To understand how the inequality is maintained, it is necessary to be familiar with the significance and application of three "fundamental laws" of the state. The Law of Return, enacted in 1950, incorporates the fundamental ideology of Zionism: that all Jews have the inalienable right to immigrate to Israel. In effect, this law gives all Jews "Jewish nationality." The Law of Citizenship of 1952 (better known, but mistakenly, as the Nationality Law) gives all persons who are accorded Jewish nationality in the Law of Return the right to claim Israeli citizenship by return automatically upon immigration, without formal procedures. The same law stipulates procedures for non-Jews to attain Israeli citizenship: (1) by residence, (2) by birth and (3) by naturalization. The World Zionist Organization-Jewish Agency (Status) Law unified the organization and the government for the development of the country and to assist the immigration and settlement of Jews. Israel does not have a written constitution. Consequently, the rights of Israeli citizens must be gleaned from "fundamental laws," which substitute for a constitution.

The general impression is that these three "fundamental laws" serve a strictly humanitarian purpose, that of providing a refuge for displaced and persecuted Jews. But their significance reaches far beyond such altruistic motives. The Law of Return codifies the fundamental principle which, in Zionist ideology, establishes the legitimacy of the State oflsrael, that is, "Israel is the sovereign state of the Jewish people." Its sovereignty is not limited to the Jewish citizens of the existing State of Israel. It claims as Jewish nationals all persons, wherever they live in the world, who are recognized by the state to be the descendants of the inhabitants of the Israelite nation that existed over two thousand years ago. In other words, there is no Israeli nationality status defined by the geographic boundaries of the state. There is an extraterritorial Jewish nationality which is accorded to all who are said to be descendants of Abraham, to whom, according to Biblical accounts, God promised the land of Canaan. Arabs are Israeli citizens, but they are not citizens by return.¹⁰ This means they do not possess nationality in Israel, for the Jewish people nationality is the only nationality status accorded by the state. It means that they are not served by Jewish (Zionist) institutions. The practical consequence is that they occupy a permanently disadvantaged position.

Despite assertions that all citizens have equal rights under the law, there is, in fact, no law stipulating that equality. The Proclamation of Independence states "full social and political equality of all its citizens, without distinction of religion, race, or sex." This document, however, does not have legal status and is thoroughly contradicted by the aforementioned "fundamental laws."

There are three primary reasons for foreigners' difficulty in comprehending that special privileges accompany Jewish nationality. The first is failure to recognize that, in Israel, there is a major difference between "citizenship" and "nationality," unlike the United States, for example, where these terms are more or less interchangeable. The misunderstanding has its origins in Israel's extra-territorial "Jewish people" nationality status, which is unique in the world because it applies to all persons of one religion, wherever they live, but does not apply to citizens of the state itself that are not of the specified religion. "Nationality" is not merely a social identification with some political connotations that is applied to the various religious and/or ethnic groups within a state, as in many Eastern European and Middle Eastern countries. In Israel, "Jewish people" nationality is regarded as a concept of international law. This opinion was stated in the Eichmann Trial Judgment of 1961. Israel's highest court held, "The Balfour Declaration and the Palestine Mandate, given by the League of Nations to Great Britain, constitute an international recognition of the Jewish people."¹¹

The confusion of "nationality" and "citizenship" is cultivated by consistent, erroneous translation of the title of the "fundamental law," the Law of Citizenship, into English as the "Law of Nationality." This law stipulates procedures for Jews and non-Jews to acquire a legal status in Israel.¹² But there is no Israeli nationality in Israel. The operation of the Population Registry Law confirms this. The registry issues identity cards to all residents, but there is no provision for registering an Israeli national. Although there is an entry for "nationality," an "Israeli" designation is not offered as an option for either Jews or non-Jews. Jews must indicate their nationality as "Jew." Others are identified as "Arab" or "Druze," etc., contradicting the Law of Citizenship, which states in translation that non-Jews may be Israeli nationals. But under the entry for "citizenship," Jews and non-Jews alike may specify "Israeli," confirming that it is not correct to translate the Law of Citizenship as the Law of Nationality. Scholars and journalists take the cue. They follow the language of the law and use the term "Israeli nationality." This helps to perpetuate the misconception that nationality and citizenship are the same, when in fact there is a basic difference between the two statuses in Israel as far as rights and obligations are concerned.

In 1970 the Supreme Court affirmed the absence of an Israeli nationality.¹³ George Tamarin, a Jewish human rights advocate, requested that his nationality identification be changed from "Jewish" to "Israeli." The request was denied by the Interior Ministry and the case came to the Supreme Court. The court ruled against Tamarin. Justice Agranat, the presiding judge, stated that the desire to create an Israeli nation separate from the Jewish nation is not a legitimate aspiration. He pointed out that a division of the population into Israeli and Jewish nations would create a schism among the Jewish people and negate the foundation on which the State of Israel was established. The court ruling specified, "There is no Israeli nation separate from the Jewish People. The Jewish People is composed not only of those residing in Israel but also of Diaspora Jewry."¹⁴

This decision, together with the operation of the Population Registry Law, leaves no doubt that there is no nationality status in Israel for Arabs. Nevertheless, the Law of Citizenship stipulates four categories, each of which is generally translated as nationality. They are: by return, by residence, by birth and by naturalization, the last three of which Arabs may acquire. The "by return" status is acquired automatically, without formal procedures, by all Jews who exercise their right, granted by the Law of Return, to immigrate to Israel. Those who do not qualify by ancestry or by religious belief to citizenship by return follow the stipulated procedures to qualify for the other categories of citizenship. The "by return" status carries with it the only true nationality status in Israel, which is "Jewish nationality." Therefore the translated title of the law is deceptive. When a fundamental law sets forth a status for all that is called "Israeli nationality," but which does not exist in practice, the message is conveyed that there are equal nationality rights and obligations for Jews and non-Jews. In this way, "Jewish nationality" seems to be relegated to an ethnic/religious identification rather than a legal one. But the privileged status of "Jewish nationality" is apparent when laws that refer to "the Jewish people" are recognized as in fact referring to those who hold Jewish nationality.

The second reason for the general failure to recognize the significance of Jewish nationality and the supra-citizenship status it confers is ignorance of the practical benefits deriving from the World Zionist Organization/Jewish Agency (Status) Law, enacted by the Knesset in 1952. According to this law, "The State of Israel regards itself as the creation of the entire Jewish people." It states that "gathering in the exiles is the central task of the State of Israel and the Zionist Movement." To carry out this responsibility, the Organization/ Agency is charged with "the development and settlement of the country, the absorption of immigrants from the Diaspora and the coordination of the activities in Israel of Jewish institutions and organizations active in those fields." The Status law is the most significant of the "fundamental laws" for recognizing Israel's legal clandestine racism.

A nation which codifies in a fundamental law that its "central task" is to serve one particular group of citizens, identified by ancestry (born of a Jewish mother) or by religion (converted to Judaism), is racist, according to the definition adopted by the General Assembly in 1965. This definition is, as stated earlier, "any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, colour, descent or national or ethnic origin." If Zionism's discriminatory principles were incorporated in a constitution, as in South Africa, its racist nature would be open to view and condemned by the world. Instead, it is given lowered visibility by specifying the discrimination in the inconspicuous Status Law.

In the Status Law, the people Israel's "mission" attempts to "ingather" as immigrants are "exiles." The language conveys the impression that the motivation is to provide refuge for homeless Jews and inhibits questions about the discriminatory character, in a state that is regarded as a democracy, of preferential immigration rules for Jews. Actually, the Zionist objective is to "ingather" all Jews. And delegating the responsibility for developing and settling the country to "Jewish" institutions fosters the mistaken impression that these functions are not funded by governmental authorities. But the Status Law makes the government and the "Jewish" institutions partners in implementing economic and development projects which directly benefit only the country's Jewish citizens.

The departmentalizing of governmental functions between the Zionist organizations and the government is reflected in the inadequately recognized distinction in Israeli law between "national" institution and "government" institution. The institutions that officially, conceptually and practically operate for the exclusive benefit of Jews are identified as "national." Among others, they include the World Zionist Organization, the Jewish Agency and the Jewish National Fund. Government institutions, such as the Ministries of Labor, Education, Housing and the Federation of Workers, officially, theoretically and in practice, but to a varying extent, serve all citizens of Israel. Institutions financed by Zionist funds-for example, the Jewish Agency-can openly discriminate in favor of Jews without seeming to taint the apparently democratic government with racism. Both the Agency and the government can claim that it is a philanthropic Jewish institution which provides advantages to the Jewish segment of the population, not a democratic Israeli government.¹⁵

The national institutions have vast resources. The Jewish Agency, through the Jewish National Fund, owns 92 percent of the land of Israel, much of which has been expropriated from Arabs.¹⁶ These lands, once expropriated, are transferred by the government to the Jewish Agency, a process which is called "redeeming the land." Non-Jewish Israeli citizens are deprived of their use by the provisions of the Jewish National Fund charter, which grants the "redeemed" land to "the Jewish people." Non-Jews are not only unable by law to own it but cannot either lease it or work upon it. As the property of the Jewish Agency, representing "the Jewish people," the land belongs to people the majority of whom are citizens of other countries. The national institutions develop the lands for agriculture, industry, social services, housing, settlements, etc., the benefits accruing only to Jews. The budget of the Jewish Agency is almost as large, and in some years has been larger, than the development budget of the government. In 1972-73, for example, the budget of the Jewish Agency was $465 million as compared with a total Israeli government development budget of $604 million for the same fiscal year.¹⁷ When the Jewish Agency's operating funds are low, the Israeli government makes up the deficit with funds that are collected through general taxation of all citizens. Between 1959 and 1967, $100 million of public monies were transferred to the Jewish Agency, as if from one part of the government to another, legally siphoning off resources to provide services for only the Jewish sector.¹⁸ In short, the Status Law legitimates an arrangement between the government and the World Zionist Organization/Jewish Agency, the effect of which is permanent discrimination against the non-Jewish sector of Israeli citizenry. The Status Law makes the government a full and equal partner in activities which provide advantages to citizens by return which are legally denied to other citizens.

A third reason for failure to understand the inequities accompanying " Jewish nationality" is that the use of the term is avoided. The status is either referred to outside Israel by the Hebrew word "le'um," as if it is untranslatable, or else "the Jewish People" is used as a euphemism. Because the generally understood connotation of "the Jewish people" is religious, in the sense of "the Chosen People" or "the Children of Israel," which are Biblical terms, its discriminatory nationalistic meaning goes unrecognized. Such semantic ambiguities obscure the fact that citizenship and nationality are separate legal statuses in Israel.

The early Zionist campaign to obtain international legal support for a "homeland" for all Jews required recognition by the international community of a "Jewish nation in exile." But many Jews, realizing that "nation" denotes a group of people whose members place loyalty to their group over any other loyalty, rejected a second nationality. To diminish this Jewish resistance to Zionist diplomatic efforts, it was necessary to avoid language which implies that Jews accept a political formula that compromises their loyalties to their domicile countries. "The Jewish people" is a more vague and therefore preferable expression than "Jewish nationality" because it implies an ethnic or religious, rather than a political or legal, nationality. But, without doubt, early Zionist leaders, as they pleaded with the international community for a Jewish state, intended "the Jewish people" to be understood as a legal nationality. In his book, Der Judenstaat, Theodor Herzl, the founder of political Zionism, stated, "We are a people...one people;" and at the First Zionist Congress, held in Basle in 1897, he made it clear that his objective was international recognition of a state in Palestine in which "the Jewish people" would enjoy rights and for which it would accept obligations. In the opinion of the Israeli Supreme Court in its Eichmann trial judgment, this objective was achieved. But this opinion was refuted in a detailed legal analysis by W. T. Mallison, an American authority on international law.¹⁹ The refutation is supported by a letter from the U.S. Department of State to Elmer Berger, then the executive vice-president of the American Council for Judaism, which states that the Department of State does not regard "the Jewish People" concept as a concept of international law.²⁰

Zionists spoke in ambiguous terms to Jews who did not wish to jeopardize their own single nationality status or the growing acculturation of Jews in Western nations but nonetheless wanted to provide support for disadvantaged Jews. "The Jewish people" was a vague enough phrase to convince most of these Jews that Zionists were referring to an ethnic/religious identification rather than a political/legal one.

Chaim Weizmann, who later became the first president of Israel, deliberately cultivated the ambiguity. He frankly confessed:

We Jews got the Balfour Declaration quite unexpectedly; or, in other words, we are the greatest war profiteers. We never dreamt of the Balfour Declaration; to be quite frank, it came to us overnight.... The Balfour Declaration of 1917 was built on air, and a foundation had to be laid for it through years of exacting work; every day and every hour of these last ten years, when opening the newspapers, I thought: Whence will the next blow come? I trembled lest the British government would call me and ask: 'Tell us, what is this Zionist organization? Where are they, your Zionists?' For these people think in terms different from ours. The Jews, they knew, were against us.²¹

Later, Weizmann rejoiced in a solid victory for Zionism in the wording of the Mandate, which referred to "the Jewish people."

This is of immense value," he said, "which will bear fruit and will open up new perspectives as yet hidden from our weak eyes.²²

While waiting for the realization of his hopes, Weizmann coined the term, "non-Zionism" to neutralize political opposition to Zionism by Jews who were willing to contribute to the welfare of persecuted Jews but were unwilling to accept the political implications of "Jewish nationality." In his own words:

...those wealthy Jews who could not wholly divorce themselves from a feeling ofresponsibility towards their people, but at the same time could not identify themselves with the hopes of the masses, were prepared to dispense a sort of left-handed generosity, on condition that their right hand did not know what their left hand was doing. To them...it was philanthropy, which did not compromise them; to us it was nationalist renaissance. They would give — with disclaimers; we would accept — with reservations.²³

Zionism's strategies, creating a privileged Jewish nationality status while portraying Israel to the world as a democracy, has created problems within Israel. There is no longer deep concern among Jews outside Israel that their support of Israel interferes with a single nationality status in Western countries. For the most part, they unquestioningly accept membership in "the Jewish people" as an ethnic or religious identification, not a legal one. But many Israeli Jews are acutely aware of the legal and political significance of Jewish nationality. In Israel, the question, "Who is a Jew?" repeatedly generates political crises that threaten the downfall of a government.²⁴

The arguments surrounding this issue concern the very validity of the foundations of the State of Israel because many Israeli Jews reject the religious requirement for Jewish nationality. But successful propagandizing that Zionism and Judaism are inseparable has served a major role in the creation and continued support of Israel. Contemporary Zionist leaders are as well aware as Weizmann was that much international support for Israel is related to the concept of "the Jewish people," identified as a nation by religion. However, the majority of Israeli Jews do not follow the tenets of Judaism.²⁵ They qualify for membership in "the Jewish people" not by religion but biologically by birth to a Jewish mother.

Zionist insistence on the inseparability of Zionism and Judaism fosters the impression that criticism of Israel is an attack on the religion of the Jews and inhibits free, political debate of lsraeli policies outside of Israel. But, in reality, authentic Judaism and political Zionism are in conflict.²⁶ At one extreme are the Naturei Karta, an ultra-orthodox sect that does not recognize the legitimacy of the State of lsrael. They believe that at a time of God's choosing, He will restore Jews to Zion. At the other extreme are those who support the Zionist State of Israel but are agnostics or atheists. Many prominent Zionists are admitted atheists. But for the sake of national unity, in Knesset debates over the issue of the religious requirement for Jewish nationality, they are forced to surrender the principle that religion should be separated from political rights and responsibilities. Golda Meier's atheism was common knowledge. But in her role as prime minister, she advocated the sacrifice of conscience to avoid a political crisis.²⁷ Menachem Begin's response to those who argue for the separation of nationality and religion reflects Israel's continuing dilemma:

And now we face the question whether — for Jews — one can separate nation from religion. I state my conviction: there can be no separation.... It is impossible to separate them. Some may ask: 'why not? There are great civilized nations where such a separation exists.'... The answer concerning the inseparability of nation from religion with regard to Jews is — Because.²⁸

Because the Zionist position defies logic, the issue of the separation of religion and nationality will continue to plague Israel.

WHO IS A JEW IN ISRAEL?

The social, economic and political privileges enjoyed by Israeli citizens who qualify for Jewish nationality make the issue of identification as a Jew a matter of critical practical concern. But the definition of a Jew remains one of the most controversial of all political issues in Israel. Some advocate that Jewish identification should be a matter of individual decision. If a person believes himself or herself to be a Jew and is willing to accept the responsibilities and obligations that being a Jew in Israel entails, that person should have the right of Jewish nationality. This position is taken by secularists who object to the religious criterion for nationality. At the other extreme, the Orthodox rabbinate insists that Jewish nationality and the Jewish religion are inseparable and that the Halachic definition of a Jew — one born to a Jewish mother or converted to Judaism — must determine Jewish nationality.

The Halachic definition was unambiguous in the society where it originated, when children of Jewish mothers followed family religious traditions. But today, many religiously nonobservant persons with Jewish mothers qualify only biologically for Jewish nationality. Belief in Judaism is a nationality requirement only if a person cannot claim Jewish identity by ancestry. It becomes necessary then to accept conversion, likewise a controversial matter. Converts qualify for Jewish nationality only when their conversion is authenticated by the Orthodox rabbinate, which does not recognize Conservative or Reform Judaism. Other problems arise when the Halachic definition determines nationality. What is the nationality status of a child of a mixed marriage when the mother is not a Jew? Should the non-Jewish spouse of an immigrating couple be required to convert to obtain nationality status when neither believes in Judaism? If a Jew converts to Christianity, is he or she eligible for citizenship "by return?" If not, and the converted Jew is a female, are her children denied nationality rights because their mother is not a Jew? Is a West Bank Muslim Arab with a Jewish mother a Jewish national? These are not crucial problems for those who follow Orthodox interpretations. The religious faction accepts no definition of a Jew other than one born of a Jewish mother or converted to Judaism by the Orthodox rabbinate. It does not matter to them that persons who qualify biologically as Jews may be agnostics or atheists and still not jeopardize their Jewish nationality, while persons born of a non-Jewish mother must undergo an Orthodox conversion to acquire full nationality rights. They are dogmatically determined that strict religious rules must govern the Jewish State, however bizarre the practical consequences in the twentieth century.

Secular Zionists cannot energetically advocate their secularist principles without exposing the profound contradiction between Zionist ideology and the reality of Zionism's alleged constituency. Zionists advertise Israel to be a secular democracy, but it is regulated as a Jewish State. A secular definition of a Jew cannot be insisted upon because one of lsrael's claims to legitimacy is based on the precept that Zionism and Judaism are inseparable. As long as the courts or the government are not required to state precisely what it is that qualifies a person for "Jewish nationality," the contradiction can be obscured by rhetoric. But when the Supreme Court is compelled to state who a Jew is, or legislation for that purpose is introduced in the Knesset, it becomes clear that there is no creditable substitute for religion for co-opting Jews into nationhood. Today's Zionists are as much at a loss for a solution to the contradiction as Weizmann admitted being. Like Weizmann, they hope the issue will not be raised. But whenever it is, the principles making for a secular political state structure in the democratic pattern are repeatedly sacrificed.

Until 1970, no legal definition of a Jew existed in Israel. For the most part, authorities accepted immigrants' statements that they are Jews and therefore eligible for citizenship by return. The Population Registry registered nationality on the basis of the applicant's declaration. In 1958, however, after a clerk questioned an applicant's statement and the applicant objected, the Ministry of the Interior issued guidelines stipulating that no proof other than a declaration by the individual is needed for registration as a Jew under "nationality." Two members of the National Religious party resigned from the government in protest, insisting that guidelines should specify the religious definition of a Jew. A public uproar ensued. The controversy, over what appeared on the surface to be a minor administrative matter, resulted in prolonged, highly emotional Knesset debates about how to define a Jew. They dominated the news for months and threatened the downfall of the government. The issue brought into focus the deep conflicts in Israeli society and the shaky foundations on which the state bases its system of national rights and obligations. Although worldwide Zionist propagandizing that Zionism and Judaism are inseparable has been a potent factor in the creation and continued support of Israel, the nonreligious majority vociferously objects when the religious minority insists on applying religious regulations to secular affairs. But the secularists always retreat. They can offer no substitute for religion and religious persecution to justify a "Jewish State" with a nationality only for Jews.

The religious faction won the debate. New directives were issued by the Interior Ministry in 1960, stating that no person can be registered as a Jew in nationality unless that person was born of a Jewish mother or converted to Judaism. It was necessary for secularist legislators to ignore conscience, because to do otherwise would negate the very foundation on which Israel was built as a "Jewish State." To require non-Jewish wives of non-religious Jews to convert to Judaism in order to have equal nationality rights is not only absurd, it is also a violation of human rights. Atheists who are required to convert to Judaism to secure nationality rights are likely to remain atheists. But expediency demands that hypocrisy prevail.

In 1962 the case of Oswald Rufeison generated another crisis over the definition of a Jew for nationality purposes. Again, the deep schism that exists over the religious issue in Israeli society was made highly visible. Rufeison was born of a Jewish mother in Poland, converted to Catholicism and was ordained as a friar. He later immigrated to Israel, where he tried to register as of Christian religion and Jewish nationality. His request for Jewish nationality was denied. He was told he must apply for citizenship through naturalization, not the Law of Return. He appealed to the Supreme Court to reverse the decision of the Interior Ministry.

The ensuing public debate this time was not strictly between the religious and secular factions, as it usually is when the definition of a Jew is in question. According to religious law, Rufeison was a Jew because his mother was Jewish and Judaism does not reject a Jewish sinner. But a Christian Jew is apparently a far greater contradiction than an atheist Jew. Therefore, spokesmen for the religious position were less aggressive and outspoken in their insistence that a Jew by birth is always a Jew. The Rufeison case debate was primarily between idealistic secularists, who supported Rufeison's claim, and practical Zionists, who rejected it. The idealists took the position that, inasmuch as Israel is a secular state, a secular definition of a Jew should apply to Rufeison and that Rufeison should be granted Jewish nationality because he was born a Jew, identifies with the Jewish people and remains a Jew in spirit despite his conversion. They correctly maintained that, if Rufeison's petition were denied, the decision would be a legal affirmation that Israel is not a secular state, but that the basis for Jewish nationality is religion. The practical Zionists were willing again to sacrifice the secular principle of separation of religion and nationality so as not to offend the many Jews, religious and non-religious, in Israel and elsewhere, who would consider a "Catholic Jew" a ridiculous contradition, if not an abomination. The court ruled against Rufeison. The religious groups hailed the decision. Although contrary to Halachic law, it was a legal confirmation of the religious basis of nationality. Some secularists were enraged, especially the young generation of atheists who refuse to accept Judaism as the criterion for their own Jewish identity. The court decision was consistent with previous surrenders of secular principles. Far more significant, it legalized theocracy in Israel.

The Shalit case provided the next major crisis. A Jewish navy commander requested the Population Registry to register his children as of Jewish nationality, although they were born of his non-Jewish wife who would not convert to Judaism. In conformity with published guidelines, his request was refused. Shalit appealed to the Supreme Court to nullify the decision which, in effect, would be a legal declaration that there is a Jewish nationality apart from the Jewish religion. The court tried to evade the issue. It urged the government to initiate legislation eliminating the entry of "nationality" in the Population Registry. The government rejected the proposal. The court then had no choice but to deal with the case, knowing that any decision would enrage some segment of Jewish citizenry.

By a 5 to 4 decision the Supreme Court ruled, after two years of publicized debate and heated controversy, that a clerk must register a child according to a parent's statement. It still evaded the larger issue by stating that its decision should not be interpreted as answering the question of who is a Jew for legal purposes. They restricted their answer to the narrow question of who is a Jew for the purpose of only this particular registration. Shalit was permitted to register his children as of Jewish nationality. But he was the last person allowed to do so under similar circumstances.

Shortly afterwards, the Knesset enacted legislation defining a Jew in conformity with religious requirements. In 1970, they amended the Law of Return. In a total surrender to the religious faction, it gave Israel its first legal definition of a Jew. The amendment states that "'Jew' means a person who was born of a Jewish mother or has become converted to Judaism and who is not a member of another religion." Israeli secularists no longer have legal grounds for objecting to a religious requirement for nationality.

Young Israelis in particular have become increasingly disillusioned and angered by the revelations emerging from these various cases that Zionism can offer no alternative to religion for legitimating the nationality of a Jewish State. And these Israeli protesters are not intimidated, as observers outside Israel are, by the dictum that criticism of Israel is an attack on the religion of the Jews. As each new government surrenders to religious dictates, scathing attacks on government policies appear in the Israeli press. They argue that the older generation of non-religious Jews was bound together by suffering and persecution. But young Israelis who never experienced anti-Semitism are led to question the basis for their "Jewish nationality." A movement for a "Hebrew" rather than a "Jewish" or "Israeli" identity has enlisted considerable following.

This dissension brings into serious question Zionism's claim of a nation of Jews, united by a common religion. The cultural and national diversity of Diaspora Jewry has not been fused into cultural and national unity in Israel. It has become expanded and reinforced. Israeli youth are tragic victims of Zionist duplicity. If, as they demand, religion were to be rejected as a requirement for nationality, Israel would become a non-Zionist state. Then, like Western democracies, legal nationality would apply equally to all citizens. In a non-Zionist Israel, Arabs would have equal rights under the law. That would require major emotional and intellectual adjustments for people who grew up in a country where discrimination against Arabs is institutionalized. Raised within the parochialism and exclusivism and contradictions of political Zionism, they learned to despise both the Arabs and those Jews who impose religious rules on them. They would be as outraged by Arab compatriots as they are by a nationality based on religion. Studies show that, in addition, they are totally estranged from Diaspora Jews, whose values are foreign to them.²⁹

In Knesset debates, some Zionist leaders have attempted to persuade secular Jews that there is an authentic tie binding all Jews together as a nation. Golda Meier said that "a long invisible thread ties Jews from generation to generation." She stressed the need for "Jews of the twentieth century to feel the long thread binding us to Jews of earlier centuries."³⁰ Appealing for increased immigration to Israel, she said,

In the last ten or fifteen years, in an ever increasing number, there are mixed marriages in numbers that scare me.... It is intolerable that precisely now, when a Jewish state exists, the number of mixed marriages increases, meaning the number of Jews in the world decreases.³¹

Mrs. Meier's concern about intermixture outside Israel has nothing to do with preservation of the Jewish religion. Immigration to Israel can only preserve "the Jewish people" in a biological sense. The Law of Marriage and Divorce prevents Jews from marrying non-Jews, but there are no laws in Israel requiring a belief in Judaism by Jews who "return" to Israel. Her cryptic statements, and those of other leaders, seem to offer secularists a hereditary basis for Jewish identity. Menachem Begin referred the issue of Jewish identity to a higher authority, declaring that God decided who is a Jew³² Knesset member Rabbi Levin said,

We are not religious and not national, but we are a special people, God's people...genuinely different from all people.³³

Explicit statements that Jews are biologically united are deterred by the Nuremberg laws having defined a Jew biologically. Honorable people everywhere condemn the Nazis' false allegations of a Jewish race on which they based their heinous policies of racial purification. Moreover, authoritative studies demonstrate substantial non-Jewish admixture in Jewish populations. It should be unthinkable for the Israelis now to make the false claim that Jews are genetically distinct from non-Jews, especially when the State is confronted with a minority problem similar in principle to that of the Third Reich. The Nazis claimed Germany's Jewish population threatened "Aryan racial purity." The Israeli concern is an Arab population that interferes with maintenance of a "Jewish State." Promoting Jewish "genetic distinctiveness" as the basis for Jewish nationality would spotlight a resemblance to an ideology that is abhorred by the civilized world.

Nevertheless, geneticists at Tel Aviv University say that the major Jewish populations in Israel show more similarities to each other than they do to the non-Jewish populations among whom they formerly lived. The statement, which contradicts the generally accepted view of the genetics of the Jews, is based on comparisons of biological data of immigrants to Israel with similar data of selected non-Jewish populations. Using blood groups, serum proteins, red cell enzymes and histocompatability antigens, Karlin et al. compared nine Jewish populations with each other and with six non-Jewish populations.³⁴ They found Ashkenazim, Sephardim and Iraqi Jews consistently close in genetic constitution and distant from Yemenite and Cochin Jews, Arabs and non-Jewish German and Russian populations. In a review of this research, Bonne-Tamir et al. say that the contribution of non-Jews to the Jewish gene pool has been extremely small.³⁵

A research report was published in an Israeli journal of science³⁶ prompting media comments such as the following, by a prominent journalist for a leading Israeli newspaper, entitled "With Tears and Sweat We Shall Build Our Race."

In our bitter fight against the race theories of H. S. Chamberlin and the Nazi, Alfred Rosenberg, the theories that brought terrible disasters to us, that allocated evil characteristics to all of us, being naturally inherited ones, so that no Jew could escape them, we tended to disregard totally the existence of biological characteristics that are common to all Jews. The Hebrew Encyclopedia,while dealing with the term, "the people of lsrael," dwells lengthily on this problem, whether the Jews are a "race," and claims that mixed marriages, conversions, rape, etc. over generations in which Jews have been living among other peoples, have eroded their biological characteristics and eliminated the "unity of the race." But just as archaeology is not a precise science, so it is with the science of genetics. Findings change; conclusions change.... Genetic research done in this country by various scientists prove that there is a great genetic bond within the Jewish people among all its communities.... The results of this research are astonishing because for years we accepted the idea that among the various communities of Jewish people there are different genes as a result of assimilation in other nations.³⁷

Bonne-Tamir et al.³⁸ do not use the word "race," as this and other newspaper articles on the subject do. But the media cannot be faulted for interpreting the research results as indicating racial unity. A statement in Nature³⁹ that the Jews "have remained to a significant degree genetically distinctive," attributed to Batsheva Bonne-Tamir, professor of human genetics at the Sackler School of Medicine of Tel Aviv University, is tantamount to saying, in lay terms, that the Jews are a race. A race is a genetically distinct population. For many years, the discussions among anthropologists and biologists about the meaning of "race" focused on the degree to which, by objective standards, a population must be genetically distinctive to constitute a race. When Dr. Bonne-Tamir states that her research shows that Jews are significantly genetically distinctive, she is saying, in effect, that the Jews are a race.

The article in Nature, a weekly journal of science which publishes reports of ongoing research submitted by the investigators, attempts to deflect a charge of racism. Nachemia Meyers states that the view of Professor Bonne-Tamir is not racist doctrine, although other scientists, who use different statistical methods, may believe so, and that Bonne-Tamir does not suggest that the Jews are better or worse for having a common genetic heritage but simply points to the evidence that genetic distinctiveness exists.⁴⁰ But whether or not Dr. Bonne-Tamir advocates biological superiority for the Jews, the danger exists that others will. When Meyers' article appeared, there were press releases to Jewish newspapers throughout the world. Some reports state specifically that the research proves the racial unity of Jews, even though the researchers never used the word "race." The media's facile translation of Jewish "genetic distinctiveness" as Jewish "race" indicates that expressions of journalists, unlike the guarded statements of the scientists conducting the research, do not reflect a concern that promotion of biological distinctiveness may sound like racist doctrine.

The research makes two contributions to Zionist ideology. It validates the claim that today's Jews are the descendants of Abraham, supporting Jewish right to the land of Israel. Dissemination of the research results for this political purpose was evident at a Presbyterian conference held in New Mexico during the summer of 1985, when a Zionist representative to the conference cited genetic studies underway in Israel that prove today's Jews are the "seed of Abraham."⁴¹ It also provides a sense of Jewish identity to Israelis who cannot, in good conscience, accept religion as a basis for their "Jewishness."

The question must be raised, however, as to whether the genetic distinctiveness of Jewish populations is sufficiently wellestablished scientifically to justify massmedia press releases on the subject, resurrecting "scientific" racism and risking the danger of exacerbating existing tensions between Jews and Arabs. There is at least one published dissent by a competent research team headed by N. E. Morton, director of the Population Genetics Laboratory and professor in the School of Public Health of the University of Hawaii.⁴² The study assessed the results of Karlin, Kenett and Bonne-Tamir⁴³ and confirms the conventional view that the major Jewish populations have absorbed considerable genetic material from non-Jews. The researchers say the statistical methodology of Karlin et al. is faulty, leading to incorrect conclusions.

A serious impediment to reliable measurements of biological distance between populations is the genetic instability of human characteristics used as the basis of such measurements. Blood elements, enzymes, antigens and serum proteins share a problem with cranial index and other phenotypic criteria that have been rejected as valid bases of racial classifications, that is, they are not selectively neutral. This means that environmental factors influence their distribution, making it an untenable assumption that changes in distribution frequencies result solely from intermixture.⁴⁴ Perhaps anticipating challenge on these grounds, Bonne-Tamir turned to the analysis of mitochondrial DNA to support her thesis of genetic distinctiveness for Jews. Mitochondrial DNA analysis, according to the report of Bonne-Tamir's research,⁴⁵ is "a sophisticated tool for genetic analysis" and "the most direct genetic measure" These statements flash a signal that the results of this new, as yet unpublished, study are well-nigh unassailable. But mitochondrial DNA analysis has even another drawback for measuring the extent of intermixture, although it surely is a sophisticated and direct approach for some genetic research purposes. Unlike genes contained in nuclear DNA, to which the male and female parent make an equal contribution, mitochondria are contained in the cytoplasm, to which the sperm makes little or no contribution. Mitochondria are therefore inherited through the maternal line only. Thus, an investigation of biological intermixture based on mitochondrial DNA analysis conveniently sidesteps the contribution of male non-Jewish genes to the Jewish gene pool. Apparently Bonne-Tamir does make an unwarranted assumption that non-Jewish males rarely impregnated Jewish females. In her review of historical events relevant to the genetics of Jews, she omits any references to interbreeding between Jews and gentiles,⁴⁶ although there is abundant historical evidence that the genetics of Jewish populations were considerably modified through the centuries by proselytism, intermarriages and extramarital sexual relationships, both violent and voluntary.⁴⁷

CONCLUSIONS

"Racism" is correctly applicable to systematic discrimination of one population against another, notwithstanding the racial composition of either population. Those who defend Israel against a charge of racism by relying on the biological definition of the term, as discrimination of one race against another, ignore the definition adopted by the U.N. General Assembly and also common usage. If antiSemitic practices are racist, despite the absence of race differences between Jews and their persecutors, it follows that anti-Arab practices by Jews are also racist. A government need not emulate the Third Reich, openly proclaiming racial superiority, to be judged a racist state. The one essential ingredient of racism is systematic discrimination by one population against another, whether on biological or cultural grounds.

Three fundamental laws legalize discrimination against non-Jewish citizens of Israel. (1) The Law of Return establishes exclusive nationality rights for Jews in Israel that are permanently denied to all Arabs, whether they were living in Palestine when the state was established or were later born there. Non-Jews do not have a nationality in Israel. (2) The Law of Citizenship establishes a class of citizenship for Arabs that leaves them permanently disadvantaged compared with Jews, whose citizenship is "by return." (3) The World Zionist Organization/Jewish Agency (Status) Law facilitates legal, economic, political and social discrimination against Arabs by delegating a wide range of national services to Zionist institutions serving only Jews.

The religious definition of a Jew has divided Israeli society into opposing factions, creating serious problems of Jewish identity among non-religious Jews who constitute a majority of the Jewish population. Ongoing genetic studies establish a biological basis for Jewish identity by sanctioning Jewish genetic distinctiveness. This allows the inference that the Zionist claim of the descent of the major Jewish populations from Abraham is a "scientific fact."

The crucial need to define a Jew is a symptom of the maladaptation of Zionism to democracy. A state whose ideology forces it to categorize its citizenry into separate segments, for the delivery of special privileges to a selected segment, must eventually have the institutionalized racism exposed. Discrimination against Israel's Arab citizens is not a phenomenon that will pass with improved vision of the Israeli electorate or enlightened policies of a new government. Whatever the social or political climate, continued preferential treatment for Jews is guaranteed by the State's fundamental laws. The 1975 U.N. resolution declaring that Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination cannot be faulted by any objective criteria.