What they aren’t for Multi-Cult Living?

Racism in Israel has been experienced by both Israeli Arabs and Israeli Jews. Israel has broad anti-discrimination laws, which prohibit discrimination by both government and nongovernment entities on the basis of race, religion, and political beliefs, and prohibits incitement to racism.^[1] The Israeli government and many groups within Israel have undertaken efforts to combat racism. Israel is a state-party to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, and is a signatory of the Convention against Discrimination in Education.

Some elements of the Israeli society have been described as holding discriminatory attitudes towards Mizrahi Jews. Intermarriage between Ashkenazim and Mizrahim is increasingly common in Israel, and social integration is constantly improving, though disparities persist.

While some Ethiopian Jews have faced discrimination, overall their absorption into Israeli society has also been cited as a unique attempt to incorporate a nonwhite group as equal citizens with full rights as part of a Western predominantly white country.

Israel says it will forcibly deport thousands of South Sudan refugees if not gone before April 1, 2012.

January 31, 2012

Israel’s Interior Ministry said on Tuesday that it will deport thousands of South Sudanese now that they have their own country, according to the Associated Press. South Sudan became independent on July 9, 2011.

Haaretz reported that an estimated 7,000 South Sudanese live in Israel. Some entered legally, but others crossed illegally over the southern border with Egypt and Gaza.

Israeli news website YNet noted that South Sudan’s per capita wealth was 0.016 percent that of Israel’s: roughly $30,000 per person, per year versus roughly $500.

The Israeli government is offering South Sudanese $1,300 if they leave before April 1, after which point they will be deported forcibly. more

thank you Bailey

Israeli racism scares me.

Op-ed: Ethiopian-born journalist fears his three children will always feel foreign in racist Israel

Newspaper headlines referring to displays of Israel‘s Ethiopian community are just headlines. Yet for me and for members of my community this wound gets deeper and refuses to heal. After every racist display, the public expresses its revulsion, yet we, members of the Ethiopian community, are left with the pain and without answers.

I was born in Ethiopia and have three young children. My wife is a nurse at a large hospital. I am a journalist at a leading newspaper. Our children are educated in private kindergartens. On the face of it, we are “successful immigrants.”

My three children were born here, yet ever since they were born, for the first time in my life I’ve been facing an uncontrollable fear. I’m anxious about their future. I assume that many of you live in some kind of fear in respect to your children’s future, yet you are worried for different reasons.

I want to tell you about my fear. It does not stem from the Iranian bomb or the war that is expected to erupt in our mad region. I’m afraid because of my children’s dissimilarity, due to the color of their skin. I’m fearful that they won’t be accepted to schools or to extracurricular activities just because they’re different. I’m fearful because once upon a time people felt ashamed to be racist, yet today Israeli racists rear their head and speak up openly.

My oldest son, who will soon celebrate his fourth birthday, already encountered this racism. One day my wife and I came to pick him up from preschool, when another child appeared and said “what a disgusting black kid.” My son withdrew into himself as my wife tried to cheer him up in vain. In the car, he burst into tears, and my wife followed. “I’m crying over my son’s helplessness,” she said.

After wiping away her tears, she asked that we return to the kindergarten so she can speak to the insulting child. She faced him and her tears kept on falling. The next morning we received a letter of apology from his parents.

Dark chocolate

Ever since then, every day I gently ask my son whether anyone called him “black” or insulted him because of his ethnicity. Usually he is silent, yet occasionally he shows interest in the color of his skin. One day he surprised me: “Dad, black is darkness, it’s not a pretty color and I don’t like it,” he said.

I tried to explain to him how beautiful our skin color is. I came up with every superlative I could think of. After failing, I suddenly remembered that my son loves chocolate more than anything else. “You see,” I told him, “chocolate is delicious. And what color is it?” I don’t know if my son accepted the comparison between chocolate and his skin color, yet he certainly ate the chocolate I gave him and asked for more. To this day I haven’t told him that there’s such thing as white chocolate too. More at source

Peres: There is no place for Racism in Israel

Posted by Amtul Q Farhat

Peres: Israel Should Thank Ethiopians for Coming Here

It’s not Ethiopian immigrants who should thank Israel for rescuing them – Israel should thank them for coming, Shimon Peres said.

Aretz Sheva: By David Lev

Continuing his campaign against racism displayed by Israelis in Kiryat Malachi against Ethiopian immigrants, President Shimon Peres told students whose parents immigrated from Ethiopia in Jerusalem this morning that Israel appreciated them – and that it was Israel that owed them thanks for coming to Israel, not the other way around.