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On the same date, Haaretz writer Gideon Levy asked: "Was Israel's Gaza offensive worth it," saying "the (past) year was a year of shame for Israel, greater shame than any other time. It is shameful to be Israeli today" given a conflict that wasn't "a war but (so unjustifiable an) assault (that) Israel's international status was dealt a severe blow, in addition to Israeli indifference and public blindness to what happened in Gaza."
An Israeli "Goliath" mercilessly attacked a "Palestinian David," then "wrap(ed) itself in sick apathy despite what was happen(ed and) refuses to open Gaza's gates to let in supplies....leaving Gaza to its fate, to its ruins."
Is this democracy? Is it better in India, America, or many other nations masking reality behind a friendly face, then running roughshod over millions at home and abroad.
Israel even does it to Jews. About 15,000 Messianic ones complain of threats, harassment and police indifference. They follow the Torah and Talmudic teachings but believe in Jesus as the Jewish Messiah. According to author Paul Liberman:
A Messianic Jew is "a person who was born Jewish or converted to Judaism, who is a 'genuine believer in Yeshua (Jesus), and who acknowledges his (or her) Jewishness." They practice bi-spiritually, outside of customary Judaism and Christianity, yet they believe they're authentic Jews, "complete" ones to the ire of secular and Orthodox Israelis, some radicalized to target them the way Israel persecutes Muslims.
In a disturbing March 2008 incident, fire damaged their Jerusalem church, and in December 2008, ultra-Orthodox Jews burned Christian holy books. These and other incidents portray a nation much different from its image, one so eroded that Shalamit Aloni's May 9, 2009 Haaretz article headlined, "Sadly, Israel is no longer democratic," saying:
there's a "Jewish state and no equality of rights....Democracy exists....only in the formal sense: There are parties and elections and a good judicial system. But there is also an omnipotent army that ignores legal decisions that restrict the theft of land and owned by people who have been living under occupation for the past 42 years. And since 1992, (a Jewish state) means an ethnocracy (in which) gentiles are (considered) donkeys."
Neoliberalism's Impact on Israeli Jews
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