The Status of Arabic in Israel: Refiections on the Power of Law to Produce Social Change

2002 ◽  
Vol 36 (2) ◽  
pp. 5-39 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ilan Saban ◽  
Muhammad Amara
Keyword(s):  
Legal Status ◽  
Minority Group ◽  
Prima Facie ◽  
The State ◽  
French Language ◽  
The Status ◽  
Official Languages ◽  
State Of Affairs ◽  
Ethnic Nation ◽  
State Of Israel

AbstractThe status of Arabic in Israel gives rise to question. Israel is a rare case of an ethnic nation-state that grants the language of minority group with a legal status which isprima facieone of equality. Both Hebrew and Arabic are the official languages of the State of Israel. What are the reasons for this special state of affairs? The answer is threefold: historic, sociological and legal. In various ways the potential inherent in the legal status of Arabic has been depleted of content, and as a result of that, as well as other reasons, the socio-political status of Arabic closely resembles what you would expect the status of a language of a minority group in a state that identifies itself as the state of the majority group to be. This answer, however, is another source of puzzlement – how does such a dissonance between law and practice evolve, what perpetuates it for so long, is change possible, is it to be expected?We present an analysis of the legal status of Arabic in Israel and at the same time we proceed to try and answer the questions regarding the gap between the legal and the sociopolitical status of Arabic. We reach some of our answers through a comparison with the use of law to change the status of the French language in Canada. One of these answers is that given the present constellation in Israel, the sociopolitical status of Arabic cannot meaningfully be altered by legal means.

scholarly journals Pour réussir le bilinguisme judiciaire au Nouveau-Brunswick

2005 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 55-67
Author(s):  
Michel Bastarache
Keyword(s):  
New Brunswick ◽  
The State ◽  
French Language ◽  
Legal Practice ◽  
Legal Proceedings ◽  
Provincial Level ◽  
The Status ◽  
Official Languages ◽  
Set Up ◽  
Legislative Measures

This article outlines the different attempts over the years to secure the status of the French language in legal proceedings in New Brunswick. A 1968 opinion reiterated rulings dating from 1650 and 1784 that English is the applicable language in all proceedings at the provincial level. Subsequent rulings have modified the state of events but in most cases on paper only. In 1980, the New Brunswick Association of Lawyers set up an investigative commitee whose tasks were to identify any inherent problems in the use of French in provincial courts and to find a way of integrating the two official languages into New Brunswick's legal practice with as little animosity as possible. The publication of the committee's report led to new legislative measures assuring the implantation of bilingualism in its provincial courts. Although legislators had hoped for speedier implementation of the measures, it is important to keep in mind the difficult context in which these changes are taking place. A change in attitude is apparently necessary before the transformation is complete.

International Law within the Israel Legal System

1990 ◽  
Vol 24 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 451-484 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruth Lapidoth
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
International Organizations ◽  
Legal System ◽  
The State ◽  
Laws Of War ◽  
International Treaties ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Military ◽  
State Of Israel ◽  
High Seas

Since the establishment of the State and up to the present day, Israeli law has had to deal with a great number of various problems in the field of international law, e.g. whether the State of Israel is a successor to the obligations of the Mandatory government; the jurisdiction of the Israeli courts with regard to offences committed in demilitarized zones or beyond the State's boundaries (on the high seas or abroad); the immunity of foreign states and their representatives from the jurisdiction of Israeli courts and from measures of execution; the status of international organizations and of their employees; the effect and implications of official acts performed within the territory of a state which is at war with Israel; the effect of international treaties in Israel; the question whether the Eastern neighbourhoods of Jerusalem are part of Israel; various issues concerning extradition, and of course, many questions regarding the laws of war: the powers of the military governor, and in particular his power to expropriate land in the territories under Israeli control and to expel residents from the territories, the extent of his legislative powers, etc.

The Question of Conscience in Why am I Doing This?

2021 ◽  
pp. 111-124
Author(s):  
ADEYEMI AMOS ADEGBOYEGA
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Analysis ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
The State ◽  
Modus Operandi ◽  
The Status ◽  
Democratic System ◽  
State Of Affairs

Greatly concerned and obsessed with the state of affairs in the country, literary artists more often than not, call to conscience the sensibilities of their audience, politicians inclusive. Against the prebendal nature of politics which is characterized by different anarchist tendencies in Nigeria, literary artists find justification for their craft as they seek ultimately to re-organize the society and confront its perils. This is the crux of this study. My concern is to rationalize Abubakar Gimba’s Why am I Doing This? banking on the interrogative undertone of the title, a variation from the norm. This interrogative undertone as will be explicated herein questions the rationalities – of the author and the actors in his observations as documented. Four essays from the collection were purposively sampled to demonstrate this. Deploying the literary tool of postcolonialism, this study a critical qualitative analysis submits that Abubakar Gimba laments the anathema and apathy that pervades the Nigerian society despite the professed democratic system of governance. He unveils the hidden and sad truths of modern Nigeria in its raw and naked form. These truths contradict her democracy. It is against this that Gimba hopes for a change in the status-quo and modus operandi of statecraft.

The Meaning and Liberal Justifications of Israel's Law of Return

2009 ◽  
Vol 42 (3) ◽  
pp. 564-602
Author(s):  
Dan Ernst
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
The State ◽  
Reasonable Expectation ◽  
Jewish Immigration ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Law ◽  
The Right ◽  
Law Of Return ◽  
State Of Israel ◽  
Land Of Israel

The Article argues for a new assessment of the significance of Israel's Law of Return—that the Law of Return reflects not the sovereign prerogative of a state to control immigration, but the right of every Jew to settle in the Land of Israel. This understanding of the Law of Return explains why Section 4 proclaims that as far as the Law is concerned, the status of Jews born within the State of Israel is the same as those arriving to Israel from abroad. Resolving the anomaly of Section 4 dispels several misinterpretations of the Law of Return and the critiques of the Law which grow out of these misinterpretations. The Article also surveys and answers several liberal objections to Israel's policy of granting preference in immigration and naturalization based on ethno-national identity and presents an argument, for giving priority to Jewish immigration and naturalization based on the extra benefits (religious, political, and communal) that Jews receive from such immigration and naturalization. Finally, it is submitted that the State of Israel has an obligation of justice to admit Jews into the state as full citizens upon their demand, since this was a reasonable expectation of those in past generations who had contributed to the existence and maintenance of the state.

The Legal Status of the Holy Places in Jerusalem

1994 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
pp. 589-600
Author(s):  
Izhak Englard
Keyword(s):  
Legal Status ◽  
Legal Aspects ◽  
The State ◽  
Court Decisions ◽  
International Conflicts ◽  
Jewish State ◽  
Legal Problems ◽  
Holy Places ◽  
Ideological Background ◽  
State Of Israel

The legal problems relating to the Holy Places in Jerusalem are of a very complex and delicate nature. The issue has a long history, and its complexity is the result of turbulent religious, ethnic, national and international conflicts over the Holy Places. The problems were not created by the State of Israel, but the establishment of the Jewish State added new dimensions to the age-old contest. I shall first describe briefly the ideological background of the problem, then analyze its legal aspects and finally illustrate its complexity by a number of Israel court decisions.

scholarly journals LEGAL INSTITUTION FOR DEMOCRATIC CIVIL CONTROL OVER ACTIVITY OF SECURITY AND DEFENSE SECTOR OF UKRAINE: STATE-OF-THE-ART OF NORMATIVE LEGAL REGULATION

2021 ◽  
pp. 39-44
Author(s):  
V.L. Zolka
Keyword(s):  
Legal Status ◽  
Freedom Of Expression ◽  
Legal Regulation ◽  
The State ◽  
Legal Institution ◽  
Military Organizations ◽  
Military Administration ◽  
The Status ◽  
Control Institution ◽  
Public Monitoring

The article is dedicated to study the status of legal regulation of legal institution “Democratic civil control over activity of security and defense sector of Ukraine” and to substantiate the theoretical recommendation as regards improvement of military and security legislation. It has been proved that uncontrollable military organizations and law enforcing bodies of the state bring potential danger both individuals and society’s humanistic values. They are dangerous because of unbalanced mechanism of the democratic civil control. Disruption of containment mechanism and counterbalance in the power separation system in the state, usurpation of power by one person or group of people can paralyze not only power itself but other institutions of society. Subjects of state segments for democratic civil control turn to be the attendant bodies of political will by one person, the certain cover-up and justification of unlawful violation. Under those conditions the civil monitoring of institutions in the security and defense sector of Ukraine becomes inefficient. Their subjects experience limitations: such as access to information of law-enforcement authorities and military formations; implementation of freedom of expression.   Most of substantial reactions are left unattended by state jurisdiction and military administration. Their legal status also remains imperfect and deprived of real impact gears on the objects under control. It has been proved that in order to ensure efficiency of openness and transparency in activity of Security and Defense Sector it is required to implement the complex of organizational and legal measures such as an active elucidative campaign for the purpose of bringing to essentiality, goal, form and tools of public control over SDS and to consolidate new philosophy where the civil control will take leading place. The certain declaratory of the most mechanisms of civil control institution have been deduced herein. The means to improve situation in this field are proposed to be developed by participation of interested subjects both public administration, members of public monitoring and subsidiary objects of new special law. By its developing the negative and positive experience of civil control has to be taken into consideration. The other way to secure the effective mechanism of democratic civil control over SDS is to specify statutory norms for SDS in the law of Ukraine.  

scholarly journals Political ideology in the legislation of the UkrSSR 1950–1960: anthropological aspect

2020 ◽  
pp. 128-137
Author(s):  
Muzyka Iryna
Keyword(s):  
Political Ideology ◽  
Legal Status ◽  
Decisive Role ◽  
Central Committee ◽  
The State ◽  
Entire Population ◽  
The Status ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Right ◽  
The Masses

In modern legal science, the anthropological approach that makes it possible to investigate, in particular, the orientation of the right to the human problem in law becomes of great relevance. In the perspective of legal anthropology, an important issue is the status of a person in the state mechanism (the place of the person in the hierarchy of values, the scope and guarantees of his rights and freedoms, the duties of the person) within the relation of state-centrism and anthropocentrism in the normative acts of the UkrSSR authorities of the post-war period. The draft Constitution of the UkrSSR in 1964 provided for a change in the legal status of the inpidual in the UkrSSR. For the first time in the history of "Soviet constitutional law" the concept of "freedom of the inpidual" was introduced, the whole complex of citizens' rights was revised, some new categories of rights were introduced, such as the supreme and fundamental human rights, the mechanism of their guarantees by society and the state was first laid. It was envisaged to consolidate various forms of direct exercise of political power by citizens, to create new forms of influence of citizens on the state power in general. Thus, in the early 1960s, the Soviet state had the potential to change qualitatively if the new UkrSSR Constitution was adopted. Therefore, the dismissal of MS Khrushchev from the duties of the First Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee and the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR appears to be conditioned, including, by the radical significance of the Constitutional project, which has never been adopted. It is possible to draw the following conclusion: in the period under study in the UkrSSR (as well as the USSR), the center of legal reality was not the person, but the norms of legal prescriptions of the state, formulated on the basis of political and ideological doctrine developed by the leadership of the CPSU – Communist Party. It is possible to characterize the status of a person under the legislation of 1950–1960 as a result of the implementation in the normative acts of political and ideological guidelines of the leadership of the CPSU – CPU. According to the communist ideology of that time, the life of society was regarded as the existence of the entire population of inpiduals, masses of people, and therefore the decisive role in the life of society belongs not to inpidual inpiduals, but to their entire population. This meant a significant overriding of the "necessary" relative to the "freedom" of man, that is, the interests of party-state leadership, collective interests over the interests of the inpidual; the non-recognition of the inpidual sovereignty of a person who was largely considered part of the collective subject – the "masses"; lack of reconciliation of interests of inpiduals and the state, which in many cases gave rise to conflict situations.

The Practice and Case Law of Israel in Matters Related to International Law

1998 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 475-527 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rotem M. Giladi
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Case Law ◽  
International Agreements ◽  
The State ◽  
International Treaties ◽  
Depth Analysis ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Government ◽  
State Of Israel ◽  
Regular Practice

On February 24, 1998, the government submitted the International Treaties (Approval by the Knesset) Bill, 1998 to the Knesset. This governmental bill represents the culmination of fifty years of exchange between the Executive and the Legislature concerning the constitutional authority to conclude international agreements on behalf of the State of Israel.Normally, it would have been preferable to await the completion of the enactment process before commenting on the new legislative arrangements. Due to the constitutional importance of the Bill and the fact that it raises several important questions, the regular practice will be abandoned in this case.Despite the availability of an abundance of materials on the treatymaking practice of the State of Israel and the status of treaties under municipal Israeli law both in English and in Hebrew, an in-depth analysis of the Bill requires an extensive expositionde lex lataon both these questions. Only then will the provisions of the Bill be presented. This will take the form of an issue-by-issue analysis, with conclusions drawn in each segment. The review will conclude with several additional observationsde lege ferenda.

Developments in Constitutional Law: Selected Topics

1990 ◽  
Vol 24 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 368-430 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shimon Shetreet
Keyword(s):  
Civil Rights ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Executive Branch ◽  
The State ◽  
Constitutional Protection ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
The Status ◽  
Relative Status ◽  
The Government ◽  
State Of Israel

The first forty years of the State of Israel witnessed significant changes in the relative status of the various branches of government. The executive was quite powerful during the early decades of the State's existence, thanks to the strong leadership of the first Prime Minister and founding father, David Ben Gurion. Accordingly, the status of the Supreme Court during that period was weak in comparison to the Executive Branch, i.e. the Government. Subsequently, the government's position weakened as the judiciary gained strength. This phenomenon was expressed in the increasing recourse to the courts to consider issues that had previously been the exclusive domain of the government. The judiciary's broader role and enhanced position vis-à-vis the executive did not bring about commensurate constitutional protection of the judicial system. In fact, we may observe a certain decline in this respect that hopefully, will be rectified when the Constitution of the State of Israel is completed with the enactment of Basic Laws on Human and Civil Rights coupled with legislation that will provide the requisite constitutional protection.

Minority Mobilisation in Greece and Litigation in Strasbourg

2008 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-48 ◽  
Author(s):  
Konstantinos Tsitselikis
Keyword(s):  
Legal Status ◽  
Minority Groups ◽  
Freedom Of Expression ◽  
Minority Group ◽  
European Court ◽  
Complex Process ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Common ◽  
Political Character ◽  
Of Greece

AbstractWhy would minorities of Greece bring their case before the European Court of Human Rights? What do the minority groups or individuals belonging to a minority group envisage when they communicate their case to Strasbourg? What are the common patterns of minority mobilisation for rights claims before the Court of Strasbourg? Minority mobilisation and litigation in Strasbourg is related to the formation of the status regarding a minority group, the latter being the product of a complex process of political character, dependent on a continuous, overt or covert struggle for power. The axis of this relation is defined by claims of the minority and their recognition or non-recognition by the state. In other terms, this struggle can be seen as a balance between demand and enjoyment of rights. These claims of minorities aim at improving, correcting or implementing the legal status. Freedom of expression, religion or association constitute the main grounds for allegations of more than 45 cases brought before the Court of Strasbourg so far. It seems that the Greek law-making and policy-implementing mechanisms are reluctant to accommodate a broader conception about membership to the Greek nation/Greek state mainly due to the continuing ideological constraints. Although religious otherness is slowly being acknowledged and institutionalised, the recognition of national otherness is so far not tolerated.

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