This week, once again, we got another look at how Israel is turning into a theocracy. Chief of Staff Benny Gantz ordered to change the phrasing of the official military memorial prayer. Instead of “Let the people of Israel remember its sons and daughters,” it will now read “Let God remember His sons and daughters.”
My colleague here on +972 Dimi Reider eloquently pointed out that this rephrasing is indicative of the changes Israel is going through:
It runs deeper than a tussle between “secular” and “religious” factions. Zionist nationalism is suffused with religion and religious terminology to the core. As pointed out repeatedly and in various forms by Jewish and Israeli thinkers over the past century (Gershom Sholem, Katznelson himself and more recently Yehouda Shenhav come to mind), you can’t claim to be completely secular while building a nation based on religious scriptures. Religiosity will eventually bubble up and reclaim its rightful place at the helm – and this is what is happening today.
The Haaretz editorial the next day also addressed the issue:
At first glance, this change seems to affect just one phrase. However, it is indicative of the major transformation taking place in the army and the entire country, which is turning from a secular country into a theocracy in which the rabbis set the rules.
The Haredi society is growing much faster than the secular, the country is becoming increasingly right wing, nationalistic on the verge of fascist. Palestinian society, as the Arab nations around it, is less secular/more religious than most Western societies.
Therefore, seeing as how we’re always talking about the two-state solution (TSS), I think it’s time we also did some rephrasing ourselves. It’s time to face reality, stop sticking our heads in the sand.
From now on, let it be called the two-theocracy solution (TTS).
