Sweden’s Recognition of “Palestine”: Do the Math

Muslims, who now make up about 7 percent of Sweden’s population, vote overwhelmingly for leftwing parties. In deciding to recognize a fictive Palestinian state, the Swedish government was motivated less by diplomatic considerations than by the desire to satisfy that crucial voting bloc. What can Israel learn from this by way of an appropriate diplomatic response? Wilhelm Roth writes:

Israel is a small state which needs to operate in the world like an empire, which knows how to use its sticks in the most effective possible manner. . . . Familiarity with [Sweden] would show that the ruling party is in fact a minority government: the coalition has 138 seats while the opposition has 211. An under-the-radar call for the opposition parties to demand that recognition of a Palestinian state only be done through parliament, and stressing their own opposition to such [recognition], along with a bag of goodies from Israel for Sweden as a whole . . . could shut down the issue for good. More than that: using this political tool is not only desirable for [Sweden’s] right-wing parties now; it would also strengthen ties between the two countries when the right wins the country.

Read more at Mida

More about: European Islam, Palestinian statehood, Sweden

It’s Time for Haredi Jews to Become Part of Israel’s Story

Unless the Supreme Court grants an extension from a recent ruling, on Monday the Israeli government will be required to withhold state funds from all yeshivas whose students don’t enlist in the IDF. The issue of draft exemptions for Haredim was already becoming more contentious than ever last year; it grew even more urgent after the beginning of the war, as the army for the first time in decades found itself suffering from a manpower crunch. Yehoshua Pfeffer, a haredi rabbi and writer, argues that haredi opposition to army service has become entirely disconnected from its original rationale:

The old imperative of “those outside of full-time Torah study must go to the army” was all but forgotten. . . . The fact that we do not enlist, all of us, regardless of how deeply we might be immersed in the sea of Torah, brings the wrath of Israeli society upon us, gives a bad name to all of haredi society, and desecrates the Name of Heaven. It might still bring harsh decrees upon the yeshiva world. It is time for us to engage in damage limitation.

In Pfeffer’s analysis, today’s haredi leaders, by declaring that they will fight the draft tooth and nail, are violating the explicit teachings of the very rabbis who created and supported the exemptions. He finds the current attempts by haredi publications to justify the status quo not only unconvincing but insincere. At the heart of the matter, according to Pfeffer, is a lack of haredi identification with Israel as a whole, a lack of feeling that the Israeli story is also the haredi story:

Today, it is high time we changed our tune. The new response to the demand for enlistment needs to state, first and foremost to ourselves, that this is our story. On the one hand, it is crucial to maintain and even strengthen our isolation from secular values and culture. . . . On the other hand, this cultural isolationism must not create alienation from our shared story with our fellow brethren living in the Holy Land. Participation in the army is one crucial element of this belonging.

Read more at Tzarich Iyun

More about: Haredim, IDF, Israeli society