Stripped of a Political Role, Kahane Campaigns for New State

Denied a seat in the Knesset by Israel’s Central Elections Commission and shunned by the Israeli news media, Rabbi Meir Kahane took his campaign for an independent Jewish “State of Judea” in the West Bank and Gaza Strip to the United States this week.

The “State of Judea” campaign is the latest effort by the leader of the outlawed Kach party to regain the spotlight lost when the Central Elections Commission declared his movement racist and undemocratic. Its move was affirmed by Israel’s High Court of Justice.

Israeli polls showed Kach capable of winning as many as five seats in last November’s elections. Kahane is eager to maintain a following among Israelis and Americans who favor annexation of the administered territories and denying Palestinians living there the privileges of citizenship enjoyed by Jews.

Because annexation is not now a viable option, Kahane said he is laying the infrastructure for an independent Jewish state in the West Bank.

He told a sparsely attended news conference here Monday that the new state is neither a gimmick nor a game. He is seeking United Nations observer status for his new state, “just like the PLO.” The Palestine Liberation Organization declared an independent state in the territories last November.

As Kahane announced in Jerusalem last week, a provisional assembly for the State of Judea has already been elected, and Education and Defense ministries are “all in place.” “Citizenship cards,” examples of which he brought to the news conference, are available for supporters in Israel and abroad.

STATE BASED ON THE TORAH

“We want to propel and push Israel to annex the territories. We don’t want two Jewish states. But more than that, we don’t want one Palestinian state,” the former Knesset member said.

Kahane envisions a democratic state based on the Torah. “A Jewish state, not a state of Jews” is how he described it. The Arab inhabitants of the territories would be given a choice of either living there without national rights or leaving.

Like many of Kahane’s pronouncements, his latest is the most radical expression of realities that Israel will have to face as it debates the future of the territories: namely, what to do about the hundreds of settlements, many subsidized by the government, built there over the last 22 years.

The Israel Defense Force has already clashed verbally with settlers demanding more protection from demonstrating Arabs. Some foretell open violence if the status of the territories changes.

Kahane said he believes support for a new state is widespread and includes representatives from 25 percent of the settlements. The militant Gush Emunim settlers movement has not supported “Judea,” he said, because the initiative “threatens them as leaders.”

Kahane denied charges by the Israeli news media that he is being treasonous. He is not urging a part of Israel to secede, he said, but rather declaring a state in areas over which Israel has not declared sovereignty.