Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed Sunday he would seek a constitutional basic law identifying Israel as a Jewish nation-state.
Speaking at the start of his weekly cabinet meeting, Netanyahu said the state currently lacked “adequate expression” of Israel’s “existence as the nation-state of the Jewish people” in the country’s set of Basic Laws.
“It will define the national right of the Jewish people to the State of Israel, and will do so without harming the individual rights of all Israeli citizens in the State of Israel,” he said. “It will fortify the Law of Return as a Basic Law. It will anchor in Basic Laws the status of the national symbols – the flag, the anthem, the language and other components of our national existence.”
He said Israel’s Jewish status is under “constant and increasing assault from the outside, and even from within.”
“There are of course those who do not want the State of Israel to be defined as the nation-state of the Jewish people,” he told the ministers. “They want to establish a Palestinian nation-state next to us, and that Israel slowly transform into a binational Arab-Jewish state in its shrunken borders.’’
He added: “The State of Israel grants equal rights, full individual rights, to all its citizens. But it is the nation-state of one nation only – the Jewish nation – and not of any other nation. Therefore, in order to fortify Israel’s status as the nation-state of the Jewish people I intend to lead the legislation of a Basic Law that will anchor this status,” he said.