Today, in honor of the first day of school, many politicians spent time visiting schools around the country.

Racism is a problem in every community and every society. No one person or movement is responsible, today, for continued racism. It is inherent within us, some more, some less, and it is on us to uproot and weed out and learn to be better.

Arabs buy homes in Jewish towns in the Galilee and that causes Jews to leave these towns, because they do not want to live with Arabs. We need to ensure that there are judges on the Supreme Court that understand this..

The whites established the State, they serve in the army, they are the engineers and technicians and they are afraid that the politicians of "Second Israel" want to take over the country.

You are in the most racist place in the world..

This ad was run in local Bet Shemesh periodicals..

Whoopi Goldberg has confused some people over the years just with her Jewish-sounding name. That's ok, as it was her and her mother's intent, allegedly, when she changed her name to try to get a foot into Hollywood because the name Johnson didnt sound Jewish enough.

The current law on the books disqualifies anyone from running for Knesset if it can be shown that the person or party incites to racism. The law has been defined as actual racism - based on someone's actual race or skin color.

The irony is so thick it can be cut with a knife.

those were the days... this show could not survive today..

This was the scene in L.A. this morning following a night of looting in a predominantly Jewish neighborhood. Several businesses were destroyed and synagogues were defaced.

What's happening in the USA right now is very sad and disturbing

After Uriah Elkayam reported about the Rabbanut policy of checking the Jewishness of Ethiopians working in the food industry in Kiryat Gat, a lawsuit was filed with the Supreme Court against the Chief Rabbi of Kiryat Gat for being responsible for this policy.

Just prior to the case being heard in the Supreme Court today, the Rabbanut issued a new policy directive. The Rabbanut has decided that they will no longer investigate the jewishness of any person just because they are members of a certain sect or community - they won't look into someone just because he is Ethiopian or Russian. It will be prohibited form now on. The only time it will be acceptable to investigate someone's Jewishness will be if there is cause for suspicion about a specific person, such as practicing tenets of another faith or religion, but not because of his connection to a group. And even then, when a suspicion arises about a specific person, they would have to investigate the Jewishness of all the workers of the factory and not just of that one person, so as not to target him and single him out. The will apply to workers in the food industry in a factory using a mehadrin hechsher.

sources: Uriah Elkayam Twitter, Kipa and Srugim

This makes a lot of sense, especially considering their Jewishness has already been checked and confirmed when they immigrated to Israel and when they married (if they are married), and there is no need for such wholesale investigations, except for perhaps in individual cases. There is no reason to operate on a racist policy that is not even necessary. It is far better to treat people with respect, and in cases where a question is raised, they will be able to check into it if deemed necessary.

MK Ran Ban Barak (Kachol Lavan) said something today that is being attacked as racist. I love how these Kachol Lavan guys, and others more to the Left, play right into the hands of Bibi so close to the elections, as if they are trying to hand him a victory on a silver platter.

Ben Barak said, "Likud is against equality. It makes a clear distinction between Jews and Arab citizens of Israel. It harms the High Court, it in fact espouses tyranny of the majority. It says: ‘If I have 61 Knesset members, I can do whatever I want and the courts don’t interest me,'” he said, echoing criticism — frequently expressed by rival politicians — of Likud rhetoric against Arab parties, attempts to push reforms in the judiciary, and efforts to legislate a clause enabling the parliament to overrule decisions by the High Court of Justice. So that’s the difference between us and Likud. Do you want to call it right and left? Call it right and left. Do you want to call it black and white? Call it black and white. They are black and we are white.”

Not really racist but it could be portrayed to be so, and it has been. Nonstop. All day today.

What is even more interesting though is that while Ran Ben Barak was attacking the Likud and saying this possibly racist statement against the Likud, Shas has jumped on the bandwagon and is running a campaign about being a proud black, the way the Likud has always done in the past when leftists called Likud voters derogatory names, such as mezuza kissrs or tchachtchachim.



Deri and others from Shas have been talking about it all day, it is now the banner of their Facebook page, they are posting the image all over.

So, is Shas saying they are Likud voters? Is Shas "taking a tremp", jumping on the bandwagon, in a fight not theirs to rile up emotions and grab some votes? Ot maybe it is legitimate because even though Ben Barak said Likud and Likud voters, he really also meant Shas?

There's a brouhaha going on with Televisio celebrity Roten Sela having said, or written on social media, a response to the talk of "we won't sit with the Arab parties" asking what is the problem with the Arabs??? Dear god, there are also Arab citizens in this country. When the hell will someone in this government convey to the public that Israel is a state of all its citizens and that all people were created equal, and that even the Arabs and the Druze and the LGBTs and — shock — the leftists are human,”.

To that Netanyahu shot back saying that we recently passed the nation state law stating that the State of Israel is not for the Arabs, Israel is not a nation for all its citizens, Israel is a country for the Jewish people, and while Arab citizens have full rights, the country is here for its Jewish citizens. Miri Regev also weighed in attacking Sela, and the fighting continues.

The truth is they are all right. Israel is a country for the Jewish people. This is a Jewish and democratic state, and it was so before the passage of the nation state law. The Arab citizens, and LGBT and all other types and races and minorities, all have equal rights and full rights and benefits and are all humans and must be treated with dignity, but the country is one for the Jewish people.

That being said, Sela's attack, and that of her backers and supporters, are all missing a point. As much as the Jewish parties have been saying they won't sit with the Arab parties, the Arab parties have always refused to sit with the Jewish and Zionist parties in a government. Even when approached for consideration they said no. They at times have been willing to support government initiatives form the outside, but as much as the Jews kept the Arabs out of government coalitions, the Arabs have kept themselves out as well, always refusing to even discuss entry..

Whether or not that might change at any time in the future I do not know, but as of now, the Arab parties have never been willing to consider joining a government.

Motka Bloi and others are, somewhat rightfully, complaining about racism and discrimination against Haredim, right now focusing on the city of Givat Shmuel that is trying to keep Haredim from nearby Bnei Braq out of its parks during the vacation period.

Fair enough. The residents of Givat Shmuel have a point, that the parks they pay tax to design and build are filled during vacations by residents of other cities who did not pay those taxes, making it difficult for the residents themselves to enjoy. Then the visitors also leave the park filthy, requiring more tax money from the residents to keep cleaning it up. They say the city of Bnei Braq should use the tax money they collect to build similar parks for its residents and provide these services on their own.

The problem is that it is a public park and everyone, even Bnei Braq, is part of the public. I think in the end the issue will end up in the courts, as it has before, and Givat Shmuel will not be allowed to block anyone from entering.

Until that point, we are getting a lot of screaming about racism and discrimination, with some even calling Givat Shmuel elders "Nazis" and other such epitaphs.

It might be an appropriate moment to point out that the Charedi community of Bnei Braq, and other places, have their own issues of discrimination. Such as, let's see a secular Jew try to buy an apartment and move into Betar or Modiin Ilit or Bnei Braq. Such as, this video report (below) on discrimination within the Haredi community when trying to register for yeshivas - with them discriminating against students of sefardi and russian descent with hurtful epitaphs of their own. Or the recent incident with the winery that was forced to move Ethiopian employees off the wine line by the Eida kashrut agency (until a public outcry pressured the owners to reverse the decision). And more and more.

Some might use the words of chazal of "כל הפוסל במומו פוסל" . I would simply say that we all have our problems and few are clean of acting with discrimination. Before calling anyone a Nazi, one might want to first look inward and evaluate of he or she is clean of such behavior.

So, as a result of the wedding that took place recently during the Maccabia games, Haaretz has declared that both the Maccabia and Jewish weddings are racist.

(note - the article is behind the Haaretz paywall. I dont think you can see the entire thing from the direct link posted above, but if you go through the link posted to Facebook, you should be able to see the entire article. At least i was able to)

The Maccabia is racist because of being an event just for Jewish athletes. Jewish weddings are racist because they promote weddings only between Jews and do not include non-Jews. And being proud and supportive of someone who converted to Judaism is also racist. Combine the three together, as the recent Maccabia wedding did, and you have the evil trinity.

A discussion around the Maccabia games would not be so bad. I think they are unnecessary now in the format they have been running. Perhaps they can be changed to being something supportive of Israel and opening it up to non-Jews. Plenty already participate anyway, just make it more official.

Regarding weddings and conversions, I am not even sure what to say. Haaretz thinks Jewish weddings are racist and conversions are racist? We shouldn't promote Jewish marriage? Have they fallen off the planet? Has the extreme heat in Israel gotten to them?

As I have said before, in my opinion, having a party like Shas in the Knesset, by its very existence, perpetuates racism/discrimination against Sefardim. As they work to supposedly rid society of racism against Sefardim, they enhance it and they effect more racism in practice.

This time it comes out in a side effect of the repealing of the core curriculum law that would have forced the Haredi educational system to teach core curriculum subjects or risk decreased funding from the government.

The side effect is in another part of the same law that was also repealed at the same time. The clause stated that it is illegal to discriminate against Sefardi young women in the various seminaries and schools. That has been repealed as well, and now it is legal to discriminate against the Sefardi women and not accept them into the schools.

That means, the Haredi parties, both UTJ and Shas, supported changing the law to make it legal to discriminate against Sefardim (in the instance of Sefardim women in seminaries).

The interesting thing about this is while intended, I am sure that the final result is not what they want. They say, and I heard this on the radio from both MK Menachem Eliezer Mozes of UTJ and MK Yaakov Margi (Shas), that of course it is bad that it is no longer illegal to discriminate and they must deal with now. However, they explained that their goal was to rid the lawbooks of everything that had been put in by Shai Piron, Minister of Education at that time - whether it was something bad or good. They don't want anything from Piron on the books affecting them and telling them what to do or not to do.

לא מדבשך ולא מעוקצך 

Not from your honey, and not from your sting, as God told Balaam when he couldn't curse the Jews so asked permission to bless them instead.

The same attitude has been in effect in their work to reverse everything put in by Lapid.

I don't recall the same attitude regarding previous Education Ministers such as Shulamit Aloni and Yossi Sarid, or other Ministers like Avraham Poraz, Tommy Lapid, and others who were considered strongly anti-Haredi. I don't even think Yair Lapid is as anti-Haredi as some of those others, yet the approach to dealing with him is generally much harsher than I remember how the others were dealt with.

Is Yair Lapid seen as the most anti-haredi ever? Is this a new approach because whatever they did back then wasn't effective enough?

Another interesting thing I noticed is that while they each spoke about the issue and about how bad it is that the discrimination exists and that the problem must be resolved, neither of them said anything about formulating a new law to replace the repealed law. Much of what was legislated by Yesh Atid a couple of years ago has been repealed and replaced with new laws more to the liking of the Haredi parties. This they repealed without replacing it with a new law formulated by them.