On the very day Haaretz reported this:
Public Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch on Wednesday said that Israel will demolish Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem in the coming days despite the renewal of indirect peace talks...Renowned Israeli journalist and Israel Prize Winner Nahum Barnea, writing in Yediot Aharonot bemoaned the surplus Arab population in Jerusalem -- and the surplus haredi religious Jews in the city spoiling it for people like him -- Israel's unreflexively racist, Ashkenazi and Zionist ruling elite. It's hard to imagine a prominent figure writing in say The Chicago Tribune about how "too many" Latinos or African Americans were spoiling the city for its white people. That's not to say some might not think it, but all but the fringes in America know this is racism of the rawest kind. In Israel, it's normal. Here's some excerpts of what Barnea says. First of all he glorifies with nostalgia, the period right after Israel's occupation of the city in 1967, when it began its ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from the eastern part in earnest:
Jerusalem was not only holy and patriotic. It was also cool, colorful, and fascinating. All one needed to do was to sit in the morning on the balcony of Gingi’s café, near the Jaffa Gate, drink a sweet Turkish coffee, watch the crowds pouring into and out of the Old City, and take in the scent of the great wide world: Various types of priests, ultra-Orthodox Jews, Palestinian females from the villages, pilgrims and their crosses, backpackers searching for cheap hostels overflowing with hashish, hummus-loving Israelis, and tourists from across the world.Then darkness (literally!) falls:
... According to city hall figures, a total of 191,000 students study at city schools; 130,000 of them study in haredi or Arab institutions. This means that an overwhelming majority of the city’s children are being educated in an anti-Zionist system. As the main language in haredi schools is Yiddish, while Arabic reigns supreme in east Jerusalem schools, we can say that Hebrew is a minority language in Israel’s capital. As result of the above is that the city is less diverse and less interesting....And then:
...Yet what’s more infuriating is the fact that so little had been done in order to influence the demographic erosion. Jerusalem took advantage of the Russian immigration wave to a much lesser extent than other cities. Not much had been done to open factories and create jobs. Hebrew University has lost its prominent status and became just another university in the eyes of the government; just another college.Now Barnea can be satisfied as the Israeli government is working as hard as international pressure will allow to ethnically cleanse the city of Palestinians in the name of... "diversity."