Alexa Ryan West

On my commute home from work, on the highway from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, the bus broke down. Tired and eager to get to a Ma'ayanot (yeshiva, or Jewish study, for girls) lecture, I gloomily hopped off the bus, perched myself on the barrier of the highway, and waited for another bus to pick me and the other Israeli travelers up. Luckily, this happened in no time, and I boarded the next bus.

In Israel, there is no concept of a queue (one of the cultural differences I'm still having trouble-and bruises-getting used to), and my fellow stranded passengers stampeded onto the new bus. I was one of the last to trickle in, and alongside me was a religious woman with a very young baby. As there was only one seat left on the bus, I gestured for her to take the seat, but her eyes just widened and she continued to stand.

The bus was filled with the normal array of Israelis: some Arabs, some teenagers texting and passing out to music, a mélange of religious men and women--some in kipot, long skirts, and others more formal in wigs and full haredi suits--and their obviously secular counterparts (a duo of tattooed, bald men sat together near the front, and a group of rowdy university students near the exit). The man with the available seat next to him was an ultra-Orthodox Jew. He was sitting in front, legs sprawled and his hat on the seat beside him.

I had forgotten. Religious Jewish men avoid sitting next to women as part of their practice of Shomer Negiah, literally meaning "observant of touch," but widely known as an Orthodox Jewish custom of men and women avoiding all physical contact. This includes everything from hugs to handshakes, but according to Biblical and Rabbinic law, sitting next to a member of the opposite sex is okay. Many men and women avoid doing so, though, because they find the potential physical contact a temptation, a reminder of the sexual world they try so hard, god fearing, to avoid.

The passengers were able to do some tetris-like rearrangements so the woman could sit down next to another woman, and the ultra-Orthodox man had another man sit next to him. The problem was solved, the entire situation taking about five minutes, but a vehemently secular man (one of the bald ones) couldn't help but express himself: he was extremely angry that the entire ordeal took place. It is disrespectful to not allow a woman, especially a young mother, a seat. A young religious man came to the defense of the older haredi, and the very familiar religious-secular debate began to take place.

Israel is a country without a constitution, and today's main domestic issue is figuring out whether or not the nation is truly a Jewish State. Sure, the bus wasn't a religious bus--but was it a purely secular bus? Lately, the news has been covering the sensitive issue of women sitting in the back of the bus per request of religious men.

There is no "back of the bus" Rosa-Parks-esque connotation here, yet many still find it disrespectful to have the women and men separated in such a way. The rapidly growing religious population (in both numbers and influence) is creating a major religious-secular divide in all aspects of Israeli life: education, army service, legislature, and even day-to-day bus rides. Israel is a very dynamic country, but reconciling its dynamism politically has become a real problem.

This also begs the question of whether or not Israel should be putting in time and effort to define whether or not it is a religious state. Sure, this ambiguity causes a lot of controversy, but would a delineated secular-religious policy solve or exacerbate the current situation? Maybe staying vague leaves more room for argument, and therefore more room for positive progression.

Either way, the bus kept on moving, just like Israel keeps on persevering in international politics. But the ride would have been much smoother, and diplomatic and domestic relations much easier, if the religious-secular divide were solved.

Israel, though known as the land of the Jewish people, is extremely diverse. One of the most fascinating populations within Israel is the Ethiopian Jewry. Israel's Law of Return entitles any Jew to immigrate and settle in Israel. Jewish immigrants receive full citizenship rights immediately upon making Aliyah. When the Jewish population in Ethiopia felt oppressed, they came in waves to Israel. The first operation was Operation Moses in 1984-5, in which 8,000 Ethiopian Jews were brought from Sudan to Israel. The second was covert Operation Solomon, in which 12,345 Ethiopians were flown via Israel's national airline, El Al, to Israel.

Most people think of Jews as coming from Eastern Europe, or from Spain and Morocco. Very few understand how a Jewish population ended up in Ethiopia. Ethiopian Jews claim that they are descendents of Queen Shiba, the wife of King Solomon. Ethiopia was home to a thriving Jewish culture, but it was slowly being oppressed by the government. The first modern contact with the now oppressed community came in 1769 when the Scottish explorer James Bruce stumbled upon them while searching for the source of the Nile River.

Israel jumped on this opportunity to congregate more Jews in the holy land. The head Rabbi of Israel claimed that the Ethiopian Jews were descendants of the Tribe of Dan (one of the twelve tribes of Israel. Dan was thought to be one of the ten lost tribes until contact was made with Ethiopian Jewry). All the Ethiopians came to Israel, and you'd think they lived happily ever after.

But alas, just like other minorities in other countries, Ethiopians have had a hard time fitting in among other Israelis. When Ethiopians arrived after Operation Solomon, public housing in Israel's main cities had all been occupied already by mass immigration from the Soviet Union. As a result, thousands of Ethiopian immigrants lived in temporary mobile homes, or "caravanim," upon arrival. Over 10,000 Ethiopians lived in absorption centers, originally meant to be temporary accommodations.

The absorption centers were designed to instigate a formalized integration process for the Ethiopians into main stream Israeli society. Many people thought the centers were a great and helpful idea, but many others resisted the centers and wanted to keep their original cultures. Ethiopian immigrants have had a lot of trouble with unemployment, lack of education, illiteracy, and illness. Because of this, Israel gives four times the amount of aid to Ethiopian immigrants than it does to any other immigrant population.

With these funds, the Ethiopian population is beginning to spread around Israel instead of being segregated into small areas, like southern Tel-Aviv. Ethiopians have established cultural centers to learn more about African Jewry. They are also slowly receiving better jobs, housing, and educations. Israelis have a lot to learn from the tolerant, vibrant Ethiopian culture, and more and more Israelis are realizing that by the day.