Tuesday, June 19, 2012

The Spy Who Loved Me

One of Israel's shining achievements is its relatively egalitarian treatment of gays and lesbians, not just compared to its neighbors but compared to any other country in the world. Among other things, Israel allowed gays and lesbians to serve openly in the IDF well before the US repealed "Don't Ask Don't Tell" (as ex-Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA) argued, this must have been because Israel lacks "Judeo-Christian values").

But National Union MK Uri Ariel, unwilling to allow Israel to have any amount of a good thing, has urged Israel stop letting gays serve in the army. To be fair, Ariel is a fringe player (National Union is a small, far-right party too extreme even for Netanyahu's right-wing coalition). And Ariel himself has admitted to serving as a spy for militant settlers as they worked to disrupt IDF activity, making him at best a weak source of credible information about what benefits Israel's security or the IDF (at worst, it makes him a traitor).

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