Judaism and Jewishness in the Jewish State

Abstract

While Israeli Jews would appear to be divided into a secular and a religious sector, a more appropriate division would be into three population groups. First is the majority of religiously observant Jews, who subscribe to a religiopolitical culture and who represent roughly 20 percent of the population. Second, there is a radical secular public, representing about 10 percent of the Jewish population, who define themselves as totally nonobservant religiously and who favor not only separation of religion and state but the dejudaization of the state. They are sometimes referred to as post-Zionists. Finally, there is the vast majority of the Jewish population, who are somewhat observant of religious custom and who continue to favor a Zionist—that is, a Jewish—state. This segment of the population lacks political and cultural leadership; it is subdivided into distinct ethnic and political segments; and it appears far weaker than it is in practice.