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Israel is the only country in which Judaism is the religion of the majority of citizens. According to the country's Central Bureau of Statistics, in 2005 the population was 76.1% Jewish, 16.2% Muslim, 2.1% Christian, and 1.6% Druze, with the remaining 3.9% (mainly immigrants from the former Soviet Union) not classified by religion.

As of 1999, 5% of Israeli Jews defined themselves as Haredim ("ultra-orthodox"); an additional 12% as "religious"; 35% as "traditionalists" (not strictly adhering to Jewish law or halakha); 43% as "secular"; and 5% as "anti-religious." Among all Israeli Jews, 65% believe in God and 85% participate in a Passover seder . However, other sources indicate that between 15% and 37% of Israelis identify themselves as either agnostics or atheists.

Of the Arab Israelis, as of 2005, 82.7% were Muslims, 8.4% were Druze, and 8.3% were Christians.

Religion and citizenship

Israel was founded to provide a national home, safe from persecution, to the Jewish people. Although Israeli law explicitly grants equal civil rights to all citizens regardless of religion, ethnicity, or other heritage, it gives preferential treatment in certain aspects to individuals who fall within the criteria mandated by the Law of Return. Preferential treatment is given to Jews who seek to immigrate to Israel as part of a governmental policy to increase the Jewish population.

The criteria set forth by the Law of Return are controversial. The Law of Return differs from Jewish religious law in that it disqualifies individuals who are ethnically Jewish but who converted to another religion, and also in that it grants immigrant status to individuals who are not ethnically Jewish but are related to Jews.

Judaism in Israel

Most citizens in the State of Israel are Jewish, and most Israeli Jews practice Judaism in some form.

While Judaism has always affirmed a collection of Jewish Principles of Faith, it has never developed a fully binding catechism. While individual rabbis, or sometimes entire groups, at times agreed upon a firm dogma, other rabbis and groups disagreed. With no central agreed-upon authority, no one formulation of Jewish principles of faith could take precedence over any other. Judaism's core belief, however, firmly remains a binding principle agreed upon by Jews of all backgrounds: the belief in one God, creator of the universe.

In the last two centuries the largest Jewish community in the world, in the United States, has divided into a number of Jewish denominations. The largest and most influential of these denominations are Orthodox Judaism, Reform Judaism, and Conservative Judaism.

All of the above denominations exist, to varying degrees, in the State of Israel. Nevertheless, Israelis tend to classify Jewish identity in ways that are strikingly different from American Jewry.

Gallup International reports that 25% of Israeli citizens regularly attend religious services, compared to 15% of Jewish French citizens, 10% of Jewish UK citizens, and 57% of Jewish American citizens.

The secular-traditional spectrum

Most Jewish Israelis classify themselves as "secular" (hiloni) or as "traditional" (masorati). The former term is more popular among Israeli families of European origin, and the latter term among Israeli families of Oriental origin (i.e. Middle East, Central Asia and North Africa). The latter term, as commonly used, has nothing to do with the official "Masorti" (Conservative Judaism) movement in the State of Israel. There is ambiguity in the ways these two terms are used. They often overlap, and they cover an extremely wide range of ideologies and levels of observance.

Many Jewish Israelis feel that being Israeli (living among Jews, speaking Hebrew, in the Land of Israel) is in itself a sufficient expression of Judaism without any religious observances. This conforms to some classical secular-Zionist ideologies of Israeli-style civil religion. While many in the Jewish diaspora who otherwise consider themselves as secular will attend a synagogue or at least fast on Yom Kippur (the holiest Jewish holiday), this is not as common among secular Israelis.

Because the terms "secular" and "traditional" not are strictly defined, published estimates of the percentage of Israeli Jews who are considered "traditional" range from 32% to 55%. Estimates of the percentage of "secular" Jews vary even more widely: from 20% to 80% of the Israeli population.

The Orthodox spectrum

The spectrum covered by "Orthodox" in the diaspora exists in Israel, again with some important variations. The Orthodox spectrum in Israel includes a far greater percentage of the Jewish population than in the diaspora, though how much greater is hotly debated. Various ways of measuring this percentage, each with its pros and cons, include the proportion of religiously observant Knesset members (about 25 out of 120), the proportion of Jewish children enrolled in religious schools, and statistical studies on "identity".

What would be called "Orthodox" in the diaspora includes what is commonly called dati ("religious") or haredi ("ultra-Orthodox") in Israel. The former term includes what is called Religious Zionism or the "National Religious" community (and also Modern Orthodox in US terms), as well as what has become known over the past decade or so as Hardal (haredi-leumi, i.e. "ultra-Orthodox nationalist"), which combines a largely haredi lifestyle with a nationalist (i.e. pro-Zionist) ideology.

Haredi applies to a populace that can be roughly divided into three separate groups along both ethnic and ideological lines: (1) "Lithuanian" (i.e. non-hasidic) haredim of Ashkenazic (i.e "Germanic" - European) origin; (2) Hasidic haredim of Ashkenazic (mostly of Eastern European) origin; and (3) Sephardic (including mizrahi) haredim. The third group has the largest political representation in Israel's parliament (the Knesset), and has been the most politically active since the early 1990s, represented by the Shas party.

There is also a growing baal teshuva ("returnees") movement of secular Israelis rejecting their previously secular lifestyles and choosing to become religiously observant with many educational programs and yeshivas for them. An example is Aish HaTorah, which received open encouragement from some sectors within the Israeli establishment. The Israeli government gave Aish HaTorah the real estate rights to its massive new campus opposite the Western Wall because of its proven ability to attract all manner of secular Jews to learn more about Judaism. In many instances after visiting from foreign countries, students decide to make Israel their permanent home by making aliyah. Other notable organizations involved in these efforts are the Chabad and Breslov Hasidic movements who manage to have an ever-growing appeal, the popularity of Rabbi Amnon Yitschak's organization and the Arachim organization that offer a variety of frequent free "introduction to Judaism" seminars to secular Jews, the Lev LeAchim organization that sends out senior yeshiva and kollel students to recruit Israeli children for religious elementary schools and Yad LeAchim which runs counter missionary programs.

At the same time, there is also a significant movement in the opposite direction towards a secular lifestyle. There is some debate which trend is stronger at present.

The secular-religious Status Quo

The religious status quo, agreed upon by David Ben-Gurion with the religious parties at the time of the declaration of independence in 1948 is an agreement on the religious Jewish role in government and the judicical system of Israel. Under this agreement, which is still mostly held today:

• The Chief Rabbinate has authority over Kashrut, Sabbath, Jewish burial and marital issues (especially divorce), and Jewish status of immigrants
• Streets of Haredi neighborhoods are closed to traffic on the Sabbath
• There is no public transport on that day, and most businesses are closed. However there is public transport in Haifa, since Haifa had a large secular population at the time of the British Mandate.
• Restaurants who wish to advertise themselves as kosher must be certified by the Chief Rabbinate
• Importation of non-kosher foods is prohibited. Despite prohibition, there are a few local pork farms in kibbutzim, catering for establishments selling "White Meat", due to its relatively popular demand among specific population sectors, particularly the Russian immigrants of the 1990s. Despite the Status Quo, the Supreme Court ruled in 2004 that local governments are not allowed to ban the sale of pork, although this had previously been a common by-law.

Nevertheless, some breaches of the status quo have become prevalent, such as several suburban malls remaining open during the Sabbath. Though this is contrary to the law, the Government largely turns a blind eye. The relationship between Judaism and the state has always been a controversial and unstable one.

There have been many problems brought forth by secular Israelis regarding the Chief Rabbinate's strict control over Jewish weddings, Jewish divorce proceedings, conversions, and who counts as Jewish for the purposes of immigration.

The state of Israel forbids and does not approve of any civil marriages or non-religious divorces performed by the secular Israeli Jews within the country. Because of this many Israelis choose to marry outside of Israel.

The Ministry of Education manages the secular (largest) and religious streams of various faiths in parallel, with a limited degree independence and a common core Curriculum.

In recent years, perceived frustration among some members of the secular sector with the Status Quo has strengthened parties such as Shinui, which advocate separation of religion from the state, without much success so far.

Today the secular Israeli-Jews claim that they aren't religious and don't follow the Jewish rules and that Israel as a democratic modern country should not force the old outdated religious rules upon its citizens against their will. The religious Israeli-Jews claim that the separation between state and religion will contribute to the end of Israel's Jewish identity.

Signs of the first challenge to the status quo came in 1977, with the fall of the Labor government that had ruled Israel since independence and the formation of a rightwing coalition under Menachem Begin. Right-wing Revisionist Zionism had always been more acceptable to the religious parties, since it did not share the same history of antireligious rhetoric that marked socialist Zionism. Furthermore, Begin needed the Haredi members of the Knesset (Israel's unicameral parliament) to form his coalition and offered more power and benefits to their community than what they were accustomed to receiving, including a lifting of the numerical limit on military exemptions.

On the other hand, secular (nonreligious) Israelis (Reform Judaism and Conservative Judaism have always had a negligible presence in Israel), began questioning whether a "status quo" based on the conditions of the 1940s and 1950s was still relevant in the 1980s and 1990s, and perceived that they had cultural and institutional support to enable them to change it regardless of its relevance. They challenged Orthodox control of personal affairs such as marriage and divorce, resented the lack of entertainment and transportation options on the Sabbath (then the country's only day of rest), and questioned whether the burden of military service was being shared equally, since the 400 scholars, who originally benefited from the exemption, had grown to 50,000. Finally, the Progressive (Reform) and Masorti (Conservative) communities, though still minuscule, began to exert themselves as an alternative to the Haredi control of religious issues.

No one was happy with the "status quo"; the Orthodox used their new-found political force to attempt to extend religious control, and the non-Orthodox sought to reduce or even eliminate it.

Role of the Chief Rabbinate

It was during the British Mandate of Palestine that the British administration established an official dual Ashkenazi-Sephardi "Chief Rabbinate" (rabbanut harashit) that was exclusively Orthodox, as part of an effort to consolidate and organize Jewish life based on its own model in Britain which encouraged strict loyalty to the British crown, and in order to attempt to influence the religious life of the Jews in Palestine in a similar fashion. In 1921, Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook (1864-1935) was chosen as the first Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi and Rabbi Yaakov Meir as the first Sephardi Chief Rabbi (Rishon LeTzion). Rabbi Kook was a leading light of the religious Zionist movement, and was acknowledged by all as a great rabbi of his generation. He believed that the work of secular Jews towards creating an eventual Jewish state in Eretz Yisrael was part of a divine plan for the settlement of the land of Israel. The return to Israel was in Kook's view not merely a political phenomenon to save Jews from persecution, but an event of extraordinary historical and theological significance.

Prior to the 1917 British conquest of Palestine, the Ottomans had recognized the leading Talmudic rabbis of the old yishuv (" settlement") as the official leaders of the small Jewish community that for many centuries consisted mostly of the devoutly Orthodox Jews from Eastern Europe as well as those from the Levant who had made aliyah to the Holy Land, primarily for religious reasons. The European immigrants had unified themselves in an organization initially known as the Vaad Ha'ir, which later changed its name to Edah HaChareidis. The Turks viewed the local rabbis of Palestine as extensions of their own Orthodox Hakham Bashis (" Chief Rabbi/s") who were loyal to the Sultan.

Thus the centrality of an Orthodox dominated Chief Rabbinate became part of the new state of Israel as well when it was established in 1948. Based in its central offices at Heichal Shlomo in Jerusalem the Israeli Chief rabbinate has continued to wield exclusive control over all the Jewish religious aspects of the secular state of Israel. Through a complex system of "advice and consent" from a variety of senior rabbis and influential politicians, each Israeli city and town also gets to elect its own local Orthodox Chief Rabbi who is looked up to by substantial regional and even national religious and even non-religious Israeli Jews.

Through a national network of Batei Din ("religious courts"), each headed only by approved Orthodox Av Beit Din judges, as well as a network of "Religious Councils" that are part of each municipality, the Israeli Chief Rabbinate retains exclusive control and has the final say in the state about virtually all matters pertaining to conversion to Judaism, the Kosher certification of foods, the status of Jewish marriages and divorces, and monitoring and acting when called upon to supervise the observance of some laws relating to Shabbat observance, Passover (particularly when issues concerning the sale or ownership of Chametz come up), the observance of the Sabbatical year and the Jubilee year in the agricultural sphere.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) also relies on the Chief Rabbinate's approval for its own Jewish chaplains who are exclusively Orthodox. The IDF has a number of units that cater to the unique religious requirements of the Religious Zionist yeshiva students through the Hesder program of combined alternating military service and yeshiva studies over several years.

Challenges from the left and right

The Chief Rabbinate is nevertheless under constant criticism and pressure from both the "left" and "right" wings of Judaism and Jewish groups. Many secular Israelis dislike the fact that their private lives are subject to the rulings of a religious court, albeit a Jewish one. The Reform and Conservative movements based in the United States resent that they are locked out of Israel's religious establishment and remain unrecognized as official Jewish religious bodies in Israel. They have established offices and synagogues in Israel to propagate their views. Simultaneously, the Haredi population, including many Hasidic groups, view the Chief Rabbinate as "too lenient", "too Zionistic", and of being the "lackeys" of the Israeli political establishment, since, for example, even members of the Knesset who are not religious, are allowed to be part of the electoral college that elects each new set of Chief Rabbis every ten years.

Jerusalem, Jews and Judaism

Main article: Jerusalem, Jews and Judaism

Jerusalem has long been embedded into the religious consciousness of the Jewish people. Jews have always studied and personalized the struggle by King David to capture Jerusalem and his desire to build the Jewish temple there, as described in the Book of Samuel and the Book of Psalms. Many of King David's yearnings about Jerusalem have been adapted into popular prayers and songs. For this reason, Jerusalem quickly became Israel's largest city; much through support of religious Israeli and diaspora Jews. In fact, Jews have maintained a majority in Jerusalem since at least 1864, according to British census records .

Nonetheless, a large portion of secular Israelis have little connection with Jerusalem and rarely visit it, in stark contrast to the centrality it is given in Israeli religious and diaspora Jewish communities.

Messianic Judaism in Israel

Messianic Judaism is a branch of Christianity which fuses a Jewish identity with a belief in Jesus as the Messiah. They emphasise that Jesus himself was a Jew, and so were his early followers. Messianic followers in Israel vary from those who hold Trinitarian beliefs like the members of Jews for Jesus to those who outright reject traditional Christianity and its symbols, in favour of celebrating Jewish festivals. Some members of Messianic congregations have some form of Jewish ethnic background. Others are Christians who choose to affiliate with Messianic congregations to capture a more authentic religious experience. While members of Christian, Muslim and other faiths are not recognized as Jews under Israel's Law of Return, , a substantial number have emigrated to Israel with some sources claiming that there are up to 10,000 in the State of Israel.

Islam in Israel

Israel lies adjacent to Islam's third holiest site or shrine after those in Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia: The Haram al Sharif (Temple Mount) from which Muslims believe that Muhammad ascended to Heaven. This belief, not only by Israeli Muslims, but by all Muslims, raises the importance of the Dome of the Rock and the adjacent Al-Aqsa Mosque. Most Muslims are angered by rumors that the Israeli government are trying to demolish the shrines, replacing them with the Third Temple. These beliefs are unfounded; in 1967, the Government of Israel acknowledged the authority of the Waqf to administer Muslim holy sites. Israel has always protected the Haram Al Sharif and even forbids Jews from saying prayers at the site of the Holy of Holies.

Most Muslims in Israel are Sunni Arabs. From 1516 to 1917, the Sunni Ottoman Turks ruled the areas that now include Israel. Their rulership reinforced and ensured the centrality and importance of Islam as the dominant religion in the region. The conquest of Palestine by the British in 1917 and the subsequent Balfour Declaration opened the gates for the arrival of large numbers of Jews in Palestine who began to tip the scales in favor of Judaism with the passing of each decade. However, the British transferred the symbolic Islamic governance of the land to the Hashemites based in Jordan, and not to the House of Saud. The Hashemites thus became the official guardians of the Islamic holy places of Jerusalem and the areas around it, particularly strong when Jordan controlled the West Bank (1948-1967).

In 1922 the British had created the Supreme Muslim Council in the British Mandate of Palestine and appointed Amin al-Husayni (1895-1974) as the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem. The council was abolished in 1948, but the Grand Mufti continued as one of the most notorious Islamic and Arab leaders of modern times, often inciting Muslims against Jews wherever he went.

Israeli Muslims are free to teach Islam to their children in their own schools.

Jerusalem and Islam

Main article: Jerusalem in Islam

Christianity in Israel

Christians are presently the smallest religious group and denomination of the Abrahamic religions in Israel. Most Christians living permanently in Israel are Arabs or have come from other countries to live and work mainly in churches or monasteries with long histories in the land.

A great paradox about the areas of Israel and its surroundings is that even though according to Christian teachings it is where Jesus was born, lived, and died (according to Roman Catholic tradition, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem is the place where Jesus died and was eventually buried -- making Jerusalem one of Christianity's holiest sites), there are nevertheless very few Christians living in the area compared to Muslims and Jews. This is because: (1) the rise of Islam displaced Christianity in almost all of the Middle East and beyond, and (2) since the rise of modern Zionism, including changes in the geopolitical balance between the world's powers, millions of Jews have flocked to the newly-established State of Israel.

Nevertheless, Christianity in Israel reveals the vestiges of the land's past and present interaction with Christian powers. Most Christians in Israel belong primarily to branches of the Eastern Orthodox Churches that oversee a variety of churches, monasteries, seminaries, and religious institutions all over the land, particularly in Jerusalem, because it was the Byzantine Empire (known as the Eastern Roman Empire) that controlled most of the Middle East from the fourth century until the 1400s, and it was that empire which embraced and nurtured the denomination of Christianity known as Eastern Orthodoxy following the East-West Schism of 1054, until its rule was broken first by the Mamelukes in 1291, and then for all time by the Islamic Ottoman Turks. In the nineteenth century the Russian Empire constituted itself the guardian of the interests of Christians living in the Holy Land, and even today large amounts of Jerusalem real estate (including the site of the Knesset building) are owned by the Russian Orthodox Church.

In between, there were periods in history when Muslims and Christians vied for control of the Holy Land. The Crusades by Western Europe from the 11th to the 13th centuries brought the influence and power of the Roman Catholic Church to the area. For example, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem is still one of the Roman Catholic patriarchs of the east. The Patriarchate of Jerusalem is the oldest Eastern Catholic Patriarchates (though the Patriarchs have not actually been resident in Jerusalem for much of the institution's history), and the only one that follows the Latin Rite. During the existence of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, the Patriarchate was divided into four archdioceses - the Archbishop of Tyre, the Archbishop of Caesarea, Archbishop of Nazareth, and the Archbishop of Petra - and a number of dioceses, spreading the seeds of this kind of Christianity in these domains, and also the Vassals of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. In 1889, the Ottoman Empire allowed the Catholic Church to re-establish its hierarchy in Palestine. Other ancient churches, such as the Armenian, Coptic and Ethiopian churches, are also well represented, especially in Jerusalem.

The upshot of the long Byzantine Eastern Orthodox history and then the Crusader Roman Catholic presence in areas of the Middle East including Israel, is that many local people accepted and clung to these official forms of Christianity as their own faith until the present time. During times of danger, many Christians were also able to worship or take refuge in well-fortified or secluded chuches that had remained committed to serving their loyal flocks in spite of being surrounded by a massive growing Islamic population.

In March 2000 the head of the Roman Catholic Church visited Israel. In an ongoing attempt to put an end to the centuries-old hostility between the Catholic Church and the Jews, Pope John Paul II visited Yad Vashem, (the Israeli national Holocaust memorial) and later touched one of the holiest sites in Judaism, the Western Wall in Jerusalem.

In modern times, one of the most vocal and active sectors of Christianity in support of Israel has come from the Protestant churches that support Evangelicalism. In the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century they were very influential in Great Britain, and some believe that this was one reason why Arthur Balfour (1848-1930) assisted with the Balfour Declaration of 1917 whereby Britain promised the Jews a homeland in Palestine. In the latter part of the twentieth century until the present it has been Evangelical groups in the United States that have favored and lobbied for the Jews' right to have their homeland in Israel.

The Evangelicals preach a biblically-oriented faith, and firmly believe in the Hebrew Bible's prophecies about the Jewish people's return to Zion (Israel) which they further believe is an absolute prerequisite for the Second Coming of Jesus. Each year hundreds of thousands of Christian Evangelicals come as tourists on private and organized trips to see Israel for themselves, to be inspired by "the land of the Bible", and in the process greatly enriching the local economy as well. There are some modern Messianic congregations in Israel where Jews who believe that Jesus is the Messiah openly meet together. There is also friction with the Israeli Jewish religious establishment as Messianic Jews have many centers all over Israel, inviting Israelis to investigate Jesus' messianic claims for themselves.

There are nine officially recognised churches, for example for the purposes of marriage and divorce. These are the Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic (Latin rite), Gregorian-Armenian, Armenian Catholic, Syrian Catholic, Chaldean (Uniate), Melkite (Greek Catholic), Maronite and Syrian Orthodox churches. There are more informal arrangements with other churches such as the Anglican Church.

Jerusalem and Christianity

Main article: Jerusalem in Christianity

The Bahá'í Faith in Israel

The Bahá'í Faith has its administrative centre in Haifa on land it has owned since Bahá'u'lláh's imprisonment in Acre in the early 1870s by the Ottoman Empire. Pilgrims from all over the world visit for short periods to time. Apart from a few hundred volunteer staff, and in agreement with the Israeli government, Bahá'ís do not live or preach in Israel.

Hinduism in Israel

Religious tensions

The State of Israel allows freedom of religion for all religious communities, both in law and in practice. Freedom House reports: "Freedom of religion is respected. Each community has jurisdiction over its own members in matters of marriage, burial, and divorce." However, some minority religious communities face social pressure and, on occasion, obstruction from the government.

Religious tensions exist between Jewish haredi Israelis and Jewish non-haredi Israelis. Haredi Israeli males devote their young adulthood to full time Talmudic studies and therefore generally get exemptions from military service in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). Originally the exemption from uniform conscription was intended to apply to a small number of elite religious students. Many leaders of haredi yeshivas encourage students to apply for exemptions from service, ostensibly to protect them from the secularizing environment of the IDF. Over the years, the number of exempt people has grown to be about 10% of conscriptable manpower.

Many secular Israelis consider the system of exemptions to be systematic shirking of duty to serve in the IDF by a large segment of society. Because of uniform conscription the burden of defending Israel is intended to be shared by all social classes, giving everyone in society a stake in the Zionist enterprise. The haredi (theological) counter-argument is that it is only in the merit of intense Torah and Talmud learning that God grants the Jews the blessings of survival in a sea of hostile enemies.

Haredi couples tend to marry at a young age (usually late teens) and often rely on government assistance sooner and to a greater extent than do secular Israelis. Haredi Israelis are also represented by haredi political parties, which like all smaller parties in a system of proportional representation may tend to wield disproportionate political power at the point when government coalitions need to be negotiated and formed following national elections.

As of October, 2005, three were main haredi parties in the Knesset: Shas with eleven seats in the Knesset representing Sephardi interests, and two Ashkenazi parties, Agudat Israel (dominated by the Hasidim) and Degel HaTorah (dominated by the Lithuanian yeshiva factions) with five Knesset seats between them. The latter two had previously been united as the United Torah Judaism alliance.

Secular Israelis often view haredi Israelis with distrust or animosity. In recent years, the Shinui party was created as a backlash to the perceived influence of the haredi parties, and to represent the interests of secular Jews that supposedly were not seen to by the other non-religious parties.

Constant tensions also exist between the Orthodox establishment and the Conservative and Reform movements. In Israel the Orthodox Jewish movements are by far the largest and strongest, with Conservative and Reform being quite small (in marked contrast to the United States). Only the Orthodox Jewish movements are officially recognized in Israel (though conversions conducted by Conservative and Reform clergy outside of Israel may be accepted for the purposes of the Law of Return).

As a result, unlike Orthodox Synagogues (or Muslim mosques or Christian churches) Conservative and Reform synagogues do not receive government funding and support. Conservative and Reform rabbis cannot officiate at religious ceremonies; thus their marriages, divorces, and conversions are not considered valid. In addition, there has been persistent tension, and even protests by outraged Orthodox worshipers, at the Western Wall, preventing Conservative and Reform Jews from holding services which violate Orthodox norms.

Messianic Jews, who are considered by some to be apostates to Judaism through their believe that Jesus was the Messiah, have faced frequent demonstrations and intermittent protests. The religious authorities of Israel consider their faith to be Christianity rather than Judaism. Messianic Jews, however view themselves as fully Jewish, and consider Jesus to be the Messiah based on the claims of the Tanakh. In 2000 a Messianic synagogue was raided in Jerusalem A congregation in Arad faced demonstrations and an arson attack in 2005.

The Israeli government often intervenes to stop the construction of new synagogues, mosques, and churches for a variety of reasons. Often it may be due to safety and environmental concerns. All groups face the same governmental scrutiny for required building permits and correct construction methods. In May 2003, Israeli government officials destroyed a newly-built Bedouin mosque in the village of Tal el-Malah after villagers defied a government ban on building a mosque to serve the local 1,500 Muslims. The nearest mosque was more than twelve kilometers away. Permission has been denied for Muslims to build mosques in other Bedouin villages.

Israel is also sometimes accused of acts of persecution against Palestinians, although even critics of Israel do not see the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Arab-Israeli conflict as being primarily religiously motivated. On the Palestinian side, several Islamic groups, notably Hamas and Islamic Jihad support the establishment of sharia law. While these conflicts may use religious overtones or rhetoric, they are generally considered military and political struggles.

Marriage and religious authority

Currently, Israeli marriage licenses are recognised only if performed under an official religious authority (whether it be Orthodox Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Druze, etc.) only between a man and a woman of the same religion, while civilian marriages are only officially sanctioned if performed abroad. This is a major issue among secular groups, as well as adherents to non-Orthodox streams of Judaism. There is fear that civil marriage will divide the Jewish people in Israel between those who can marry Jews and those who cannot, leading to concerns over retaining the character of the Jewish state.

See also

• Culture of Israel
• Jewish denominations
• Politics of Israel

Notes

1. ^ "Table 2.1 — Population, by Religion and Population Group". Statistical Abstract of Israel 2006 (No. 57). Israel Central Bureau of Statistics. 2006. {{cite book}}: External link in |chapterurl= (help); Unknown parameter |chapterurl= ignored (|chapter-url= suggested) (help)
2. The Largest Atheist / Agnostic Populations on Adherents.com, 27 March 2005.

References

• Leibman, Charles S. Religious and Secular: Conflict and Accommodation Between Jews in Israel. AVICHAI, 1990.
• Leibman, Charles S. and Elihu Katz, eds. The Jewishness of Israelis: Responses to the Guttman Report. SUNY Press, 1997.
• Mazie, Steven V. Israel's Higher Law: Religion and Liberal Democracy in the Jewish State. Lexington Books, 2006.

External links

• Directory of Chabad-Lubavitch centers in Israel
• The Masorti Movement (Conservative Judaism in Israel)
• Israel Movement for Progressive Judaism
• The Future Role of Religion in Israel
• Pluralism: Synagogue and the State of Israel
• Kehilot |Secular & Religious Jewish Communties In Israel
• Then and Now: Trends in Israeli Judaism
• "You Say You Want a Constitution", New York Times Op-Ed piece by Professor Steven V. Mazie
• "Changing Israel's Marriage Law" The Jewish Week Opinion piece by Professor Steven V. Mazie
• Religion and State in Israel: a Discussion a three-way discussion between Anat Hoffman (executive director, Israel Religious Action Center), Professor Steven Mazie (author of Israel's Higher Law: Religion and Liberal Democracy in the Jewish State) and Rabbi Avi Shafran (director of public affairs, Agudath Israel of America)

• Religion in Israel
• Judaism