The Non-Orthodox of Israel

Non-Orthodox Jews, whom are also referred to as secular, reform, or conservative Jews, find themselves in the midst of internal religious conflict within the state of Israel and Orthodox Jews.  They consist of 80 percent of Israeli Jewish population in the country, but regardless of what type of Jew they are, they are still Jews nonetheless.  There are those that "eat milk and meat, but never on Sabbath.  Most are two holiday Jews who pray in synagogue only on Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur. Others pray in the soccer stadium, but only when their team is losing" (Rosenthal, 232).  Most non-orthodox Jews still believe in God and Jewish spirituality but are just not as interested in the synagogue based aspect of the religion.  This leads to Orthodox Jews looking down upon those are not Orthodox.

 At times there would be discrimination.  For example, when Sivan Meshulam was a little girl, she would walk home from school and the Haredi would call her a certain name.  It turned out that she was being called a slut in Yiddish.  It is known that "Haredi men on 'modesty patrol' sometimes harass secular women with exposed arms and legs who enter their neighborhood.  They have thrown ink and cursed at dozens of women…" (Rosenthal, 235).  If anything, it is the Orthodox who are at the root of the discrimination because of their very biased point of views.  Sivan feels that "it really annoys [her] that there are narrow-minded haredim who think everything that deals with Judiasm is theirs.  They believe they have better values, that they're holier than use.  We're also legitimate Jews" (235). 

This picture deals with the high tension between the religious and the non religious jews in Israel. Original source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/yonilcom/2864358139/

As stated in this recent article regarding Israel violating religious freedom, the Religious Freedom Report places Israel with Afghanistan, China, Iran, Iraq, and Sudan in the list of governments that lack government protection of non-Jewish holy sites.  "Government allocations favoring the Orthodox, extra legal protection to Jewish holy sites and Orthodox hegemony over life-cycle events are among Israel's religious freedom violations".  The report said that "Government allocations of state resources favored Orthodox (including Modern and National Religious streams of Orthodoxy) and ultra-Orthodox (sometimes referred to as 'Haredi') Jewish religious groups and institutions, discriminating against non-Jews and non-Orthodox streams of Judaism".  It was also reported that the state does not recognize conversions performed by non-Orthodox rabbis.  The only marriages that can be recognized are those that have been performed by the Orthodox Jewish establishment.  The same goes with who can be buried at Jewish state cemeteries.  It is good to see that what is going on in Israel is being recognized throughout the world as a problem.

There are some really interesting points of view in chapter 11 of the Rosenthal book regarding the subject on non-Orthodox Jews.  She used real life examples to show the struggles that these non-Orthodox Jews face on a daily basis.  There is a lot of insight provided and to be honest, I was completely unaware of this issue.  To help gain a better understanding, I was able to find an article on the Jerusalem post that was posted just a couple days ago (November 18)!  Things are not going to change until the Orthodox Jews that have control over the government are willing to provide the non-Orthodox with assistance in their fight for religious freedom.  

Israel's Tech Industry

Israel has one of the biggest high tech industries in the world and it continues to see exponential growth.  Even Bill Gates famously said "that Israel has developed the best high-tech culture outside the United States" (Rosenthal, 92).  In the city of Haifa, well known companies such as Microsoft, Sun Microsystems, GE, Motorola, IBM and Hewlett-Packard have R&D centers.  One of the biggest companies in Israel is Intel.  The engineers at this particular building did most of the work on the Pentium processors.  Also, they developed the Centrino and Dotan chips that are now used in laptops in secrecy along with chips for cell phones.  Intel also happens to be Israel's largest foreign investor.  According the a relatively recent Jerusalem Post article, "the high-tech industry in Israel makes up about 15 percent of its $200 billion yearly GDP, but accounts for a full 40 percent of Israel's exports, according to the Ministry of Finance". Its technological exports by monetary value include high-tech, medi-tech, and agri-tech products.  Their economy isn't based off of oil, but the sand and brains of the Israeli people.

Intel's building located in Haifa, Israel. 

Not only does Israel's tech businesses produce smart chips and innovations that make our lives easier, they also work to make our lives healthier by producing new biological breakthroughs.  It just so happens that "Israel has more engineers, scientists, life science researchers, and physicians per capita than any country in the world" (96).  Israel is also the fourth when it comes to the number of biotech, medical devices, and diagnostics startup companies.  If you have ever heard of the "PillCam", then now you know it was invented by an Israeli.  It was invented by Gavriel Iddan who is a missile scientist with a wild imagination.  This invention made it possible to bring good news to millions of people that might have suffered from tumors, ulcers, irritable bowel syndrome, and Crohn's disease.  Just one of many life saving inventions by an Israeli.

Gil Shwed is known as the Bill Gates of Israel (they call him Gil Gates).  He made the company CheckPoint (a leader in internet security and one of Israelis most imported firms on the Nasdaq) into a multibillion dollar company and in 2002 was on the front page of Forbes as one of the worlds few self-made billionaires.  Gil happened to be a computer programming prodigy but worked for the IDF before becoming an entrepreneur.  Many believe that the reason why the Israelis have been so successful in this field is because they are "so innovative because they always question what they're told to do" (83).  Even the current Prime Minister Netanyahu believes that technology should always be a priority of Israel in order to stay competitive in the long run.

Gil Shwed, the Bill Gates of Israel as he poses for Forbes Magazine. 

Most of the information for this blog came from chapter 4 in the Rosenthal book and an article (which is linked earlier in the post) from the Jerusalem post.  Donna Rosenthal's chapter is full of facts and interesting innovations made by Israelis.  She dedicated a solid 20 pages on this topic in which I was very impressed with. She praises the Israelis for being some of the smartest people in the world.  While I got the majority of my information from Rosenthal, I was able to obtain that article from JPost in which the author mainly focuses on the tech economy and how important it is to help companies that are just beginning. Overall, I was intrigued a great deal by this topic. 

Israel's conflict with Lebanon and Ahadinejad

Tensions have been rising in Israel since the construction freeze on the West Bank was lifted just last month.  As of earlier today, the situation just got a bit stickier when Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad let loose an anti-Israel speech in Lebanon just four kilometers from its border with Israel.  He stated "Zionists, go back where you came from" while telling his audience (who were thousands of Hezbollah supporters) to "Bring defeat to the Zionists" by forcefully freeing themselves.  Ahmadinejad also blames Israel for the economic crisis and air pollution of the world.  His whole speech was a complete verbal  bashing of Israel along with an attempt to discredit other western nations including the United States.  It is clear that Ahadinejad wants to wipe Israel off the map and he attends to gather as many supporters as possible.  He only sees the violent method of solving this conflict. Not once was there anything mentioned about peace.

Just a few hours after Ahadinejad's speech, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu noted that Lebanon was on its way to become an "extension of the ayatollah regime in Iran…This is a tragedy for Lebanon, but Israel knows how to protect itself from this development".  He believes that "All those people who think that Zionism will disappear — not only is it not disappearing, but it is growing stronger".  Netanyahu continued by stating that the fact that Israel was created and has developed into a strong nation in only 62 years is enough to discredit those seeking to harm it.  While Israel has developed a significant amount since its birth of a nation, Netanyahu seems to be antagonizing the enemies of state by purposely gloating about the success of Israel.  Provoking another war would just create pointless death in a region of the world that has already been covered in blood.  When questioned about assassinating Ahadinejad, Netanyahu did not give a direct answers, but said as a general statement that "we consider with reason what needs to be done to protect the state".  With that being said, Israel indirectly says it would assassinate an enemy if it were done for the safety of the nation.  Surely, these two heavy weight leaders of the middle east have strong feelings of disgust towards each other.  Peace talks will just prolong the inevitable. 

After these recent events, I have come to the conclusion that peace will not come soon enough in the middle east.  There is too much hostility between nations and powerful militant groups that reside within them.  But it is not for me to say if politics will prevail or not. 

I find the reliability of my articles to be solid.  Both sources came from the highly rated Israeli news sites Haaretz and The Jerusalem Post.  If you read both of the articles closely, you will notice that authors Chaim Levinson and Herb Keinon were as unbiased as they could possibly be.  They both quoted quite a bit and I just interpreted how I saw fit.  However, I will admit that there were a few sentences that seemed like their point of views favored Israel, but overall, it was just a series of quotes by Ahmadinejad and Netanyahu with very little author commentary. 

Life Expectancy in Israel

With all of the negative attention Israel has been receiving lately, there happens to be some good news to share.  Israel is now proud to announce that there are major gains in the raising of its peoples life expectancy.  Over the last 30 years, life expectancy of Jewish Israelis has increased considerably and ranks above the average of countries that are included in the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD).  Even Israeli Arabs, who tended to always be a handful of years behind due to cultural, social and educational reasons now live slightly longer than the average American.  Some credit can be given to the national healthcare system and other medical improvements for improving outcomes of Israeli lives.

Even though there is a positive increase in life expectancy, the difference in health outcomes among the several socioeconomic groups, mainly between the Jewish and Arab Israelis is still substantial.  It is just one of many challenges that the system is attempting to improve.  Since 1980, Israel has far outpaced those of other countries in the OECD and the USA (In 1980, however, all 3 were identical with a life expectancy of 74 years).  While the USA's life expectancy has only increased its average by 4 years and the other OECD countries by 6 years, Israel has increased a spectacular 7 years.  In 2005, a country and country comparison proved that Israeli Jews and Arabs are shown to live longer than people of any other country in the Middle East.  That same study also suggests that Israeli Jews actually live longer than the residents of all but four countries in the world.

Though life expectancy is important in the sense that it reflects information about health outcomes of entire life times, infant mortality rates are just as important because it focuses on the survival of infants during their first year of life.  In 1960, Israeli Arabs had a double mortality rate compared to that of Israeli Jews, Americans, and other OECD countries.  Today, Israeli Jew mortality rates are greater than the USA and are slightly above the rest of the OECD.  The remarkable thing is that Israeli Arabs showed the greatest decline and had the same mortality rate of the USA by 2005. Israel still hopes to continue its good fortune of life expectancy for as long as possible.

I find the reliability of this article strong.  The author, Judy Siegel-Itzkovish, got her research from the Jerusalem’s Taub Center for Social Policy Studies in Israel in a comparative study done by Professor Dov Chernichovsky, a leading health economist at the center and Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Beersheba (she states it in the main article).  Not once does the author go off on a tangent or become biased in anyway.  This article is purely facts in which she got her research directly from the source.  However, not only was her research solid, she is part of "Israel's best-selling English daily and most read English Website", The Jerusalem Post.  She does a good job in picking out the most important details from the study.  Her point of view is quote obvious; she wants the world to know that the Israeli health care system is improving and that they plan on continuing to improve upon these statistics in the years to come.  Overall, I found this article to be quite surprising and can honestly say I have learned a great deal from it.

Main Article

Is it worse to be a Palestinian in Jerusalem or Gaza? The author attempts to discover which Palestinians have it worse under Israeli rule.  Israel has imposed extreme methods of isolation and insulation on Gaza.  Those who live there are cut off from water supplies and from any cultural, social, or family ties they have with their people. Then on the other hand, you have those Palestinians who are living in East Jerusalem.  The cynicism of the decision makers is turning the population there into a bunch of slum dwellers and then those same decision makers are priding themselves on the fact that they give those people national insurance payments.  In the neighborhood of Isawiyah, there are large piles of concrete and an immense collection of garbage.  Because of construction prohibitions, those who live there steal pieces of concrete from the roads so that it can be used on buildings.

There are some statistics that prove to be rather disturbing.  In Palestinian Jerusalem, about 65 percent of the Palestinian residents live below the poverty line compared to that of 30 percent of the Jewish population.  74 percent of Palestinian children in Jerusalem live below the poverty line whereas only 45 percent of the city's Jewish children do. Few classrooms exist in the area and about 50 percent Palestinian school children drop out.  24,500 dunams (6,000~ acres), were appropriated from Arab owners while 50,000 housing units were built on the same land for the Jewish population.  

The authorities prevent any Palestinians from building or developing land and instead allocate vacant lots to the Jews.  This tends to bring a rise in confrontations so the Housing and Construction Ministry provides hundreds of armed guards for the Jews at the public's expense.  Much of the time when Palestinians complain to the police, they are looked at as the suspects.  When Jews really are the suspects of causing bodily harm, the case ends up being closed in a swift matter.  For the Palestinians, there is no sense of security.  They feel that the authorities are aggressive, abusive, and belligerent.  They live in a world of constant violence even though the ministry denies that the guards harass them.  The ministry also said the guards are even praised for their professionalism because they show restraint and forbearance.  Roni Leibowitz, legal adviser to the police, believes that the testimonies of suspects are misleading because of their "erroneous portrayal of the way the situation developed".  Either way, conflict will always be unavoidable.

Haaretz, one of the largest Israeli news resources, is the world's leading English language website for real time news of Israel and the Middle East.  Also, since it is a source that was provided by the professor, I find its reliability even more credible.  What makes this article even more dependable  is the fact that the author got much of their sources by firsthand experience.  Amira Hass, who has held her post at Haaretz for 17 years, physically traveled to these hostile environments to get her information directly from the people living their instead of relying on false or undependable sources.  Her view on the subject is obvious throughout the article.  She honestly feels that the Palestinians of Gaza and Jerusalem both get treated inhumanly.  It seemed that she originally thought that Gaza was a worse place to live, but after her travels it seemed that was not the case.  Those Palestinians who live in Jerusalem do have it worse and she has seen it with her own two eyes.  

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My name is Ross Sheridan.

Here is a link to an article I found regarding holiday services in your pocket.