How are rights and freedoms respected in Israel?
Israel is a democracy in which all citizens have equal rights. There is equality of religion, race and gender before the law. Non-Jewish citizens have equal civil and political rights, and representatives of Arab and other minorities play a full and active role in the state, including as ministers in the government, justices of the Supreme Court, members of parliament, senior academics, ambassadors, members of the civil service, and in the military. In Israel, women have achieved substantial parity at almost all levels of society. In 2008, both the president of the Supreme Court and the speaker of the parliament were women. All democratic freedoms familiar to a western democracy are present in Israel. The country has a vigorous and diverse free press, a very well developed and active civil society and a highly respected judicial system protecting individual rights, as testified by the international freedom and democracy watchdog Freedom House.
Israel has an extremely diverse society. As in many other states, the challenge of accommodating cultural, ethnic and political differences is an important feature of the country’s domestic political agenda. The vision of Israel’s founders was of an open and democratic state with a Jewish majority in which non-Jews would enjoy full and equal rights. The principle of equality for all citizens was enshrined in Israel’s Declaration of Independence and is protected by Israel’s Supreme Court. There are many successes in this regard. All democratic freedoms familiar to a Western democracy are present in Israel. The country has a vigorous and diverse free press, a very well developed and active civil society and a highly respected judicial system protecting individual rights. This is affirmed by the international freedom and democracy watchdog Freedom House. In Israel, women have achieved substantial parity at almost all levels of society. In 2008 the president of the Supreme Court, the forei
