Languages of Israel

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The Israeli population is a linguistically and culturally diverse community. The 15th edition of Ethnologue lists 33 languages and dialects spoken in local communities, whether small or large [1]. The main language used for communication among Israeli citizens is Modern Hebrew, a language that emerged in the late 19th century, based on different dialects of ancient Hebrew and heavily influenced by European languages. Several laws determine the official status of languages and language policy in Israel. This confusing situation led to several appeals to the supreme court, whose rulings enforced the current policy of national and local authorities.

Contents 1 Official status of languages 1.1 Hebrew 1.2 Arabic 1.3 English 2 Other Languages 2.1 Policy towards immigrants' languages 2.2 Non-official languages widely spoken in Israel 3 See also

[edit] Official status of languages

Currently, there are two official languages in Israel; Hebrew and Arabic. The status of English is semi-official. The main law that governs the language policy is the 82nd paragraph of the "Palestine order in council" issued on August 14, 1922[2], for the British Mandate for Palestine:

All Ordinances, official notices and official forms of the Government and all official notices of local authorities and municipalities in areas to be prescribed by order of the High Commissioner, shall be published in English, Arabic and Hebrew.

This law, like most other British Mandate's laws, was adopted in the State of Israel, subject to certain amendments published by the provisional legislative branch on May 19, 1948.

[edit] Hebrew

The 1922 Palestine order in council was the first in modern time to acknowledge Hebrew as an official language of a political entity. This was a significant achievement of the Zionist movement which sought to establish Hebrew as the national language of the Jewish people, and discouraged the use of other Jewish languages, particularly Yiddish.

The movement for the revival of Hebrew as a spoken language was particularly popular among new Jewish Zionist immigrants, who came to Palestine since the 1880s. Eliezer Ben-Yehuda and his followers created the first Hebrew speaking schools, newspapers and other Hebrew speaking organizations. After his and the impetus of the Second Aliyah (1905-1914), Hebrew prevailed as the single official and spoken language of the Jewish community of Palestine. When the State of Israel was formed in 1948, the government saw Hebrew as its prime language as a matter-of-fact decision, and initiated a melting pot policy, where every immigrant was required to study Hebrew and often to adopt a Hebrew surname. Yiddish, which was the prime competitor before World War II, was banned, and the number of Yiddish speakers subsided as the older generations died out.

Today, Hebrew is the language used in official correspondence, in the Knesset debates, in court sessions and other official procedures. Hebrew lessons are compusory in Arabic-speaking schools from the 3rd grade onwards, and a Hebrew exam is an essential part of the matriculation exams for students of these schools.

[edit] Arabic

Arabic is also listed as an official language. Arabic is spoken mainly by Israeli Arabs, although some members within the Mizrahi and Yemenite Jewish communities also speak it. 150,000 Arab Palestinians left remaining in Israel in 1949, who mostly did not speak Hebrew. Today there are more than a million Arab Israelis, and most of them speak Hebrew fluently.

For many years the Israeli authorities were reluctant to use Arabic, except when explicitly ordered by law (e.g. in warnings on dangerous chemicals), and when addressing the Arabic speaking population. This has changed following the November 2000 supreme court ruling, which determines that although second to Hebrew, the use of Arabic should be much more extensive. Since then, all roadsigns, food labels and other legally required messages must be translated into Arabic, unless being issued by a local authority of an entirely Hebrew speaking community.

Arabic was always considered a legitimate language for use in the Knesset, but only rarely do Arabic speaking Knesset members make use of this privilege. This is due to the fact that while all Arabic speaking MKs are fluent in Hebrew, only few Hebrew speaking MKs can understand Arabic.

Arabic lessons are widespread in Hebrew-speaking schools from the 7th grade to the 9th grade. An Arabic exam is optional in the matriculation exams for Hebrew speaking schools. This means that while all educated Arabic speaking Israeli citizens speak fluent Hebrew, Hebrew speaking citizens usually have poor knowledge of Arabic.

[edit] English

The amendments to the British Mandate's legal system, issued in May 1948 (paragraph 15-b) states:

Any order in the law which requires the use of the English language is hereby abolished.

This does not exclude English from the list of official languages, but it abolishes the priority given to English under the British Mandate rule. In practice the use of English decreased dramatically during the state's first years. At first, Israel used French as a diplomatic language, even though most state officials and civil servants were more fluent in English. During the late 1960s, the Israeli-French alliance was undermined, giving way to a stronger Israeli-American alliance, and paving the way for the English language to regain some of its lost status. Today, English is the main language for foreign communication exchange, but it is not allowed in Knesset debates or in formulating laws. Some British Mandate laws are still formulated in English, and their translation into Hebrew is done gradually. English has few native speakers in Israel, but is mandatory as a second language in schools and universities, for both Hebrew- and Arabic-speaking students.

[edit] Other Languages

[edit] Policy towards immigrants' languages

The melting pot policy, which governed the Israeli language policy in its early days, was gradually neglected during the late 1970s. While in the 1950s the Israeli law banned Yiddish theatres and forced civil servants to adopt Hebrew surnames, the new policy allowed immigrants to communicate with the authorities in their language of origin and encouraged them to keep their original language and culture. This new practice has become evident since the early 1990s, due to the massive immigration to Israel from the former Soviet Union. The Israeli authorities started to use Russian and Amharic extensively when communicating with the new immigrants. During the 1991 Gulf War, warnings and instructions were issued in at least 7 languages.

[edit] Non-official languages widely spoken in Israel

Because Israel is a multi-cultural society, many other languages are known by large sectors of the population. The main ones are as follows:

• Russian - Russian is by far the most widely spoken non-official language in Israel, not taking English into account. As much as 16% of Israelis are fluent in Russian after mass immigration from the USSR and its successor states in the 1990s and 2000s. The government and businesses often provide information in Russian, and it is semi-official in some areas.
• Yiddish - the Ashkenazi Jewish language and the second-most widely spoken Jewish language, it is a variant of German. It was banned in Israel's beginning days, but is making a cultural revival in the 21st century. However, critics say that it is dying with the old generations of Ashkenazi Jews.
• Ladino - the Sephardi Jewish language and the third-most widely spoken Jewish language, it is a variant of Spanish. It is spoken by some Sephardi Jews.
• Romanian - it is estimated that there are several hundred thousand immigrants from Romania and their descendants in Israel. As such, Romanian is often encountered among this group.
• Polish - no longer very common, this language was spoken by the large aliyah from Poland. Today, it is somewhat common in Polish moshavei ovdim, created during the 1940s and 1950s.
• Ukrainian - while most Ukrainian Jews prefer to speak Russian, there is a large segment of Ukrainian speakers, especially since the Orange Revolution in Ukraine.
• Spanish - spoken by Jews from Argentina and other olim from other Spanish-speaking countries, and some Sephardi groups. It is not restricted to Sephardim, as most Argentinian Jews are actually Ashkenazim.
• French - spoken by many Moroccan, Algerian and Tunisian Jews as a second language. It is also taught in many Israeli schools, which cannot be said about some of the aforementioned languages.
• Italian - spoken mainly by many Italian Jews. Also, many Jews from Libya (a former Italian colony) speak Italian as primary or second language.
• Persian - spoken by many former Jewish immigrants from Iran and their children.
• Kayla and Qwara - the languages of the Beta Israel (Ethiopian Jewry). Also spoken by some Beta Israel is Amharic.
• Chinese, Tagalog and Thai - while spoken by a negligible amount of Israeli Jews, Chinese, Tagalog and Thai are making a headway in Israeli society in the 21st century, due to an influx of illegal non-Jewish immigrants from China, The Philippines and Thailand. It is estimated that there are 180,000 such illegal immigrants. Many (though mostly Vietnamese) legally entered the country when Israel (and very few other countries) opened their doors to "boat people" from war-torn Southeast Asia in the 1970s.

[edit] See also

• Demographics of Israel