Israel’s Ethiopian Jews clash with police at race rally
Dozens injured during anti-racism rally in Tel Aviv sparked by brutality against a black soldier.
Israeli riot police have fired stun grenades and water cannon on thousands of ethnic Ethiopian Jewish citizens in an attempt to clear one of the most violent protests in memory in the heart of Tel Aviv.
The protesters, Israeli Jews of Ethiopian origin, were demonstrating on Sunday against what they said was police racism and brutality after a video clip emerged last week showing policemen shoving and punching a black soldier.
Demonstrators overturned a police car and threw bottles and stones at officers in riot gear at Rabin Square in the heart of Israel’s commercial capital.
Israel’s Channel 2 television said tear gas was also used, something the police declined to confirm.
“I’ve had enough of this behaviour by the police, I just don’t trust them any more … when I see the police I spit on the ground,” one female demonstrator who was not identified told Channel 2 before police on horseback had charged.
Racism in Israel refers to all forms and manifestations of racism experienced in Israel, irrespective of the colour or creed of the perpetrator and victim, or their citizenship, residency, or visitor status.
More specifically in the Israeli context, however, racism in Israel refers to racism directed against Israeli Arabs by Israeli Jews,[1] intra-Jewish racism between the various Jewish ethnic divisions (in particular against Ethiopian Jews,[2] and to historic and alleged current racism towards Mizrahi Jews and other Jews of colour), and racism on the part of Israeli Arabs against Israeli Jews.
Racism on the part of Israeli Jews against Muslim Arabs in Israel exist in institutional policies, personal attitudes, the media, education, immigration rights, housing,[3] social life and legal policies. Some elements within the Ashkenazi Israeli Jewish population have also been described as holding discriminatory attitudes towards fellow Jews of other backgrounds, including against Ethiopian Jews, Indian Jews, Mizrahi Jews, Sephardi Jews, etc. Although intermarriage between Ashkenazim and Sephardim/Mizrahim is increasingly common in Israel, and social integration is constantly improving, disparities continue to persist. Ethiopian Jews in particular have faced discrimination from non-Black Jews. It has been suggested that the situation of the Ethiopian Jews as ‘becoming white’ is similar to that of some European immigrants like Poles and Italians who arrived in the United States in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.[4]
Israel has broad anti-discrimination laws that prohibit discrimination by both government and nongovernment entities on the basis of race, religion, and political beliefs, and prohibits incitement to racism.[5] 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. Israel’s President Reuven Rivlin announced to a meeting of academics in October 2014 that it is finally time for Israel to live up to its promise as a land of equality, time to cure the epidemic of racism. “Israeli society is sick, and it is our duty to treat this disease,” Rivlin stated.
