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Naftali Bennett is more theocratic than Netanyahu. He defends his arguments saying "The bible says...". He does this even in international interviews, where int

Naftali Bennett is more theocratic than Netanyahu. He defends his arguments saying "The bible says...". He does this even in international interviews, where interviewers are looking for answers that a diverse audience can understand. He served as an education minister in Israel despite being heavily theocratic. In the US, we mock people that try to teach intelligent design in schools. In Israel, you put them in charge of education. You can respect freedom of religion but claiming that the Bible prevails over international law is just absurd. Ratified treaties are law, not scriptures and books sacred to a religion. Many countries do not have an official religion and most states do not have Judaism as an official religion. The bible argument just doesn't work. What is that kind of discourse going to achieve? Clearly making Israel more popular is not among those things.

ceejayoz 5y ago
As an example: https://twitter.com/mehdirhasan/status/1399079468132622339 https://twitter.com/mehdirhasan/status/1399079468132622339 It’s a wild interview.
pmoriarty 5y ago
"In the US, we mock people that try to teach intelligent design in schools. In Israel, you put them in charge of education." There have been plenty of theocrats in high positions of power in the US, and teaching Intelligent Design is not a laughing matter for large portions of the American population. In fact, we may see some cases supporting the teaching of Intelligent Design come before the Supreme Court before long, and given the conservative dominance of the court those cases could well be decided in Intelligent Design's favor.
YZF 5y ago
We should probably say "The Old Testament" since the term "Bible" is ambiguous. The US is predominantly Christian and Christianity has a big influence on day to day life. "In God We Trust" on USD? Or https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_Orden_v._Perry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_Orden_v._Perry ? Many other countries are basically "Christian" countries or "Muslim" countries or insert your favorite religion. It's just not spelled out as such because it's a given. Is Christmas a holiday? Or is it Yom Kippur? It's easy to advocate for freedom of religion when 99.9% of the population is Christian or Muslim or <insert your favorite religion>. The old testament is at least partly a historical document so referring to it as part of understanding the conflict is acceptable. Now if your argument simply reduces to "because g*d said so" then I agree it's not a very strong one, but Bennet is an intelligent person and I doubt that's the only reasoning he gives.

ceejayoz 5y ago

As an example: https://twitter.com/mehdirhasan/status/1399079468132622339 https://twitter.com/mehdirhasan/status/1399079468132622339 It’s a wild interview.

pmoriarty 5y ago

"In the US, we mock people that try to teach intelligent design in schools. In Israel, you put them in charge of education." There have been plenty of theocrats in high positions of power in the US, and teaching Intelligent Design is not a laughing matter for large portions of the American population. In fact, we may see some cases supporting the teaching of Intelligent Design come before the Supreme Court before long, and given the conservative dominance of the court those cases could well be decided in Intelligent Design's favor.

YZF 5y ago

We should probably say "The Old Testament" since the term "Bible" is ambiguous. The US is predominantly Christian and Christianity has a big influence on day to day life. "In God We Trust" on USD? Or https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_Orden_v._Perry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_Orden_v._Perry ? Many other countries are basically "Christian" countries or "Muslim" countries or insert your favorite religion. It's just not spelled out as such because it's a given. Is Christmas a holiday? Or is it Yom Kippur? It's easy to advocate for freedom of religion when 99.9% of the population is Christian or Muslim or <insert your favorite religion>. The old testament is at least partly a historical document so referring to it as part of understanding the conflict is acceptable. Now if your argument simply reduces to "because g*d said so" then I agree it's not a very strong one, but Bennet is an intelligent person and I doubt that's the only reasoning he gives.