by Asher Shechter in HaAretz

Ruby Rivlin is the President of The Real Israel

On July 24, Reuven Rivlin will mark his first year as Israels president. Just
three months into his term, in October, he became the first Israeli president to
attend a memorial for the 1956 Kafr Qasem massacre, in which Israeli Border
Patrol officers shot and killed 47 Israeli Arabs. In the months since, Rivlin has
continued to boldly embrace his role as Israels collective
conscience, defending the rights of Palestinians and of Arab-Israelis and other
minorities and speaking out against intolerance, on occasion to the chagrin of
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
But this week, speaking at the 2015 Herzliya Conference a prestigious
gathering that has become a centerpiece of Israels political calendar Rivlin
may have made his boldest move yet: He told the uncomfortable truth about the
country of which he is president. He told its people that the country many of
them think they live in does not exist.
Israel, Rivlin said, is fast becoming a tribal state composed of four groups
secular Jews, religious Zionist Jews (also called national religious), ultraOrthodox (Haredi) Jews and Arabs, all of them fearful, hostile to one another
and even to members of their own group. Today, the first grade classes are
composed of about 38 percent secular Jews, about 15 percent national religious,
about one quarter Arabs, and close to a quarter Haredim, Rivlin noted. He said
the demographic processes that these numbers represent have created a new
Israeli order ... in which there is no longer a clear majority, nor clear minority
groups and consisting of four principal tribes, essentially different from each
other, and growing closer in size. Whether we like it or not, the make-up of the
stakeholders of Israeli society, and of the State of Israel, is changing before
our eyes.
It was a perceptive analysis that has escaped many Israelis, including, as Rivlin
noted, many of its leaders.
Perhaps anticipating the likely response of many Israelis, the president stressed
that the new Israeli order is not an apocalyptic prophecy. It is the reality.
All these different groups, said Rivlin, are here to stay. And whereas the Israel
Defense Forces once served as a central tool for fashioning the Israeli
character. In the military, Israeli society would confront itself, would
consolidate, and shape itself morally, socially and in many ways economically,
now that over half the population most Arabs, most Haredi Jews and a
growing number of secular Jews does not serve in the military, this is no

longer the case. Israelis will meet for the first time, if at all, only in the
workplace, Rivlin said.
He called on Israelis to abandon the accepted view of a majority and minorities,
and move to a new concept of partnership between the various population
sectors resting on what he called four pillars:
1. A sense of security for each sector, so that it is confident that joining the
partnership does not require giving up basic elements of their identity
2. Shared responsibility for Israeli society and the state
3. Equity and equality
4. The creation of a shared Israeli character.
It was a remarkable speech, first of all, because it is true. By 2059, according
to a 2012 report by Israels Central Bureau of Statistics, Israeli Arabs will be
23 percent of the population and Haredi Jews will be 27 percent. Already, as
evident by this years election results, Israeli society is increasingly divided into
rival ethnic, cultural, religious and geographic groups that have little in common.
Whether its the animosity between Ashkenazi and Mizrahi Jews, the conflict
between Jews and Arabs, the hatred between left and right or the rivalry
between Tel Aviv and the rest of Israel, in recent years Israeli politics has
increasingly reflected this growing divide, with views and ideologies largely
replaced by cultural and ethnic affiliations.
Rivlins speech was also remarkable for its candor, the same candor that has
helped make Israels one-state president he believes in a single state
between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan river also its most
popular public figure.
In his address to the Herzliya Conference, Rivlin proved that he is president of
the real Israel. Its not as obvious as it seems: Israels current government
governs an imaginary country, its prime minister presides over a fictitious land.
In their imaginary version of the state, Israel has a clear Jewish Zionist
majority, its Jewish identity doesnt clash with its self-definition as a
democracy (as it has so often in recent years), and senior ministers honestly
believe that any criticism must stem from anti-Semitism and they pretend
Israel can just boycott the entire world.
In the land of leaders leading imaginary lands, politicians who face reality headon are a rare breed. Also at the Herzliya Conference, opposition leader Isaac
Herzog repeated cliches of yore, such as disengagement from the Palestinians
as if thats still possible, as if the two-state solution can simply be revived.
Warning that the creation of a binational state would endanger Israel, Herzog
ignored the fact that the binational state is already being created.

Whether they are trying to segregate buses on the West Bank or

they believe that boycotting the boycotters is a recipe for foreign-relations
success, Israeli politicians seem to be disengaged from reality, lost in solipsism.
Theirs is a country where acts have no consequences, where cultural and
demographic shifts trends are meaningless or transient.
But there is a real Israel, even if its politicians refuse to acknowledge it. More a
federation of tribes than a unified society, it is on the verge of radical change.
Its people often live in fear of each other. It has a richness of culture, of
languages and sensibilities, but it is also incredibly ethnocentric and extremely
exclusionary. It can redefine itself. It must redefine itself. But in order for
that to happen, its leaders must first come to terms with its real face.