# Simple question about Israeli Democracy **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 16, 2015, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-question-about-israeli-democracy/715110 "2015-03-16T13:58:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Shinna\_Minna\_Ma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f08c70/32.png) [@Shinna\_Minna\_Ma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shinna_Minna_Ma)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-question-about-israeli-democracy/715110/21 "2015-03-18T17:14:00Z")
> [@UDS](#): > > Presumably Israeli citizens resident in the West Bank - settlers, in other words - get to vote in Israeli elections? Or, on the basis that the West Bank is not part of Israel, are they treated like other expatriate citizens, and denied the vote? I am an Israeli citizen living in the Shomron, or the West Bank, as you call it. Yes, we all get to vote in Israeli elections. We pay taxes, carry Israeli identity cards, and drive cars with Israeli license plates. We even paid that stupid TV tax (or avoided it), just like the rest of the country. ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-question-about-israeli-democracy/715110/22 "2015-03-18T19:17:05Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > The great (ok, one of the great) dilemma facing Israel is that it wants to be two things that are potentially incompatible: a democracy, and a homeland for the Jews. Having a 20% minority Arab population as citizens is fine; it shows that Israel is a secular democratic state, but one where Jews just happen to be the overwhelming majority. The question is what happens if that ever changes. The two equally ugly prospects are either becoming a minority again, which historically has not worked out well; or declaring that Israel exists for the Jews, and that people of other ethnicities will not have the same rights as the People in the People’s Land, which would be distressingly similar to a certain German nationalist movement of years past. > > FWIW, Israel is hardly the only country with this problem; many European countries are wondering if waves of migration are swamping the ethnic character of their countries, which they had taken for granted for centuries. This is exactly what I’ve been thinking about lately, and what prompted my desire for a deeper (read: more than none) understanding of how representative Democracy and citizenship works in Israel. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-question-about-israeli-democracy/715110/23 "2015-03-18T19:31:49Z")
Do Israeli citizens living in, say, the United States get to vote in Israeli elections? ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-question-about-israeli-democracy/715110/24 "2015-03-18T19:46:11Z")
> [@Eonwe](#): > > This is exactly what I’ve been thinking about lately, and what prompted my desire for a deeper (read: more than none) understanding of how representative Democracy and citizenship works in Israel. As a proportional representation, it’s a messyd emocracy. > [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > Do Israeli citizens living in, say, the United States get to vote in Israeli elections? One interesting point - I heard an interview yesterday with a voter who had moved to Israel from the USA a year ago. I gathered this meant that some people get Israeli citizenship(? Voting rights?) immediately. Note there is an ongoing conflict on who gets to decide who is a 'real Jew". The fundamentalist parties have been able to leverage their small number of votes to force the government to install strictly orthodox rabbis as the arbiters of all things religious, which includes deciding who qualifies for things like immigration entry as a member of the Jewish faith. ---
**Author:** ![Shinna\_Minna\_Ma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f08c70/32.png) [@Shinna\_Minna\_Ma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shinna_Minna_Ma)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-question-about-israeli-democracy/715110/25 "2015-03-18T19:47:52Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > Do Israeli citizens living in, say, the United States get to vote in Israeli elections? No. Absentee ballots are available only to those working for the Israeli government (diplomats). Those in the IDF vote on their bases. ---
**Author:** ![Shinna\_Minna\_Ma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f08c70/32.png) [@Shinna\_Minna\_Ma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shinna_Minna_Ma)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-question-about-israeli-democracy/715110/26 "2015-03-18T19:57:39Z")
> [@md2000](#): > > One interesting point - I heard an interview yesterday with a voter who had moved to Israel from the USA a year ago. I gathered this meant that some people get Israeli citizenship(? Voting rights?) immediately. Jews who emigrate to Israel (called making aliyah) are granted immediate citizenship along with all rights, privileges, and obligations. > [@](#): > > Note there is an ongoing conflict on who gets to decide who is a 'real Jew". The fundamentalist parties have been able to leverage their small number of votes to force the government to install strictly orthodox rabbis as the arbiters of all things religious, which includes deciding who qualifies for things like immigration entry as a member of the Jewish faith. You are perhaps speaking about the Jewish Agency for Israel, which oversees the emigration process. Jews who move here are granted automatic citizenship under the Law of Return. As of 1970, automatic citizenship is also granted to “non-Jewish children, grandchildren, and spouses, and to the non-Jewish spouses of their children and grandchildren.” (from the Jewish Agency website) ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-question-about-israeli-democracy/715110/27 "2015-03-18T20:17:50Z")
The whole “Who’s a Jew” issue only applies to converts, who are relatively rare in Judaism. Even the most Orthodox rabbis haven’t tried to block the immigration rights of people who are Jewish solely from their fathers’ side, although they won’t accept them as Jews. ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2015, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-question-about-israeli-democracy/715110/28 "2015-03-20T18:06:42Z")
The problem with becoming, say, a state of the USA - is ceding almost all serious decision making to a remote government whose concern is not focussed on their specific needs. If this happened, too, worst case would be because the Arab minority became too big to ignore. Also, why would anyone want to take on he Middle East headache? One-fifth of Israel is Arab. If they voted in good numbers as a bloc, the Combined List should get about one fifth of 121 seats or 24 seats - making them tied for second biggest bloc in the Knesset. ---
**Author:** ![Isilder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/cc9497/32.png) [@Isilder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isilder)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2015, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-question-about-israeli-democracy/715110/29 "2015-03-20T20:01:44Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > The whole “Who’s a Jew” issue only applies to converts, who are relatively rare in Judaism. Even the most Orthodox rabbis haven’t tried to block the immigration rights of people who are Jewish solely from their fathers’ side, although they won’t accept them as Jews. The immigration thing is more that they do favour people who are jews, so that anyone who is properly religiously Jewish (maternal line… ) is not denied immigration to Israel … the example was Jewish Somalis… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-question-about-israeli-democracy/715110.md?page=1)