Languages of Israel

[
Hebrew, English, Russian, and Arabic, used by the Israel Postal Authority on packages delivered within Israel.]

The Israeli population is a linguistically and culturally diverse community. The 15^th edition of " [http://www.ethnologue.com/home.asp Ethnologue] " lists [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_country.asp?name=IL 33 languages and dialects] spoken in local communities. The main language used for communication among Israeli citizens is Modern Hebrew, a language that emerged in the late 19^th century, based on different dialects of ancient Hebrew and influenced by Yiddish, Slavic languages, and German. Several laws determine the official status of languages and language policy in Israel. This confusing situation has led to several appeals to the supreme court, whose rulings have enforced the current policies of national and local authorities.

Official status of languages

Currently, there are two official languages in Israel: Hebrew and Arabic. English, which has semi-official status, is used extensively at all levels of society. The main law governing language policy is the 82^nd paragraph of the “Palestine Order in Council” issued on [http://domino.un.org/UNISPAL.NSF/361eea1cc08301c485256cf600606959/c7aae196f41aa055052565f50054e656!OpenDocument August 14, 1922] , for the British Mandate of 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 laws of the British Mandate, was adopted in the State of Israel, subject to certain amendments published by the provisional legislative branch on May 19, 1948.

Hebrew

The Palestine Mandate articles, issued by the Council of the League of Nations in 1922, and the 1922 Palestine Order in Council were the first in modern times to acknowledge Hebrew as an official language of a political entity. This was a significant achievement for 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 (born in the Russian Empire) and his followers created the first Hebrew-speaking schools, newspapers, and other Hebrew-language institutions. After his immigration to Israel, and due to the impetus of the Second Aliyah (1905-1914), Hebrew prevailed as the single official and spoken language of the Jewish community of mandatory Palestine. When the State of Israel was formed in 1948, the government viewed Hebrew as the "de facto" official language and initiated a melting pot policy, where every immigrant was required to study Hebrew and often to adopt a Hebrew surname. Use of Yiddish, which was the main competitor prior to World War II, was discouraged, [As described by the Yiddish-speaking actor Nathan Wolfowicz in the Israeli Yiddish newspaper "Letzte Naies" on 20 July 1951. [http://www.haaretz.co.il/hasite/pages/ShArtTower.jhtml?itemNo=410894&contrassID=nl&nl=31_03 A Hebrew translation] of his article by Rachel Rozhenski appeared in "Haaretz" on 31 March 2004.] and the number of Yiddish speakers declined as the older generations died out, though Yiddish is still commonly used in Ashkenazi haredi communities.

Today, Hebrew is the official language used in government, commerce, Knesset debates, court sessions, schools, and universities. Hebrew is a required subject in Arabic-speaking schools from the third grade onwards, and a Hebrew exam is an essential part of the matriculation exams for students of Israeli schools.

The state-affiliated Academy of the Hebrew Language, established in 1953 by a Knesset law, is tasked with researching the Hebrew language and offering standardized rules for the use of the language by the state. Although its decisions are supposed to be mandatory, their application varies from government bureau to bureau, while commercial adoption of the Academy’s rules (such as in the print media) is voluntary.

Arabic

Arabic, along with Hebrew, is also an official language in Israel. Arabic is spoken primarily by Arab citizens of Israel and Israeli Druze, as well as by some Mizrahi and Yemenite Jews, particularly those of the older generation who immigrated from Arabic-speaking countries. In 1949, 156,000 [cite web|title=Dr. Sarah Ozacky-Lazar, Relations between Jews and Arabs during Israel’s first decade (in Hebrew)|url=http://lib.cet.ac.il/pages/item.asp?item=13336] Palestinian Arabs were left inside Israel’s armistice line, most of whom did not speak Hebrew. Today the vast majority of Arab Israelis, who constitute nearly a fifth of the Israeli population, speak Hebrew fluently.

For many years the Israeli authorities were reluctant to use Arabic, except when explicitly ordered by law (for example, in warnings on dangerous chemicals), or when addressing the Arabic-speaking population. This has changed following a November 2000 supreme court ruling which ruled that although second to Hebrew, the use of Arabic should be much more extensive. [cite web|title=The official text of the Israeli supreme court ruling (in Hebrew)|url=http://elyon1.court.gov.il/files/99/120/041/a10/99041120.a10.HTM] Since then, all road signs, food labels, and messages published or posted by the government must also be translated into Arabic, unless being issued by the local authority of an exclusively Hebrew-speaking community.

Arabic was always considered a legitimate language for use in the Knesset, but only rarely have Arabic-speaking Knesset members made use of this privilege. This situation can be easily explained: while all Arabic-speaking MKs are fluent in Hebrew, very few Hebrew-speaking MKs can understand Arabic.

Arabic lessons are widespread in Hebrew-speaking schools from the seventh through ninth grades. Those who wish to do so may opt to continue their Arabic studies through the twelfth grade and take an Arabic matriculation exam.

In March 2007 the Knesset approved a new law calling for the establishment of an Arabic language academy similar to the Academy of the Hebrew Language. This institute is due to be established in 2008. [ [http://www.knesset.gov.il/Laws/Data/law/2092/2092.pdf The law in Hebrew] in the Israeli official gazette (publication no. 2092 from March 28, 2007).]

English

The amendments to the British Mandate’s legal system, issued in May 1948 (paragraph 15-b) state::"Any order in the law which requires the use of the English language is hereby abolished."This did not exclude English from the list of official languages, but did abolish the priority given to English under the British Mandate rule. In practice the use of English decreased dramatically during the state’s early years. At first, French was used 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-United States alliance and paving the way for the English language to regain much of its lost status. Today, English is the primary language for international relations and foreign exchange, but it is not sanctioned for use in Knesset debates or in drafting legislation. Some British Mandate laws are still formulated in English, and the process of their translation into Hebrew has been gradual. English is required as a second language in schools and universities, for both Hebrew- and Arabic-speaking students.

Other languages

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-language theaters 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 with massive immigration from the former Soviet Union and the additional immigration from Ethiopia. Israeli authorities began to use Russian and Amharic extensively when communicating with these new immigrants. During the 1991 Gulf War, warnings and instructions were issued in at least seven languages.

Non-official languages widely spoken in Israel

Because Israel is a multicultural society, many other languages are used 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. As many as 16% of Israelis are fluent in Russian after mass immigration from the USSR and its successor states in the 1970s, 1990s, and 2000s. The government and businesses often provide information in Russian, and it is semi-official in some areas.
* Romanian: It is estimated that there are more than 500.000 thousand Romanian-speakers in Israel, and it's the second largest "foreign language" in Israel.
* Amharic: Spoken by most of Israel’s 100,000 Ethiopian Jews, most of whom arrived in two massive operations transporting tens of thousands of Ethiopian Jews from Ethiopia to Israel in 1984 and 1991, Amharic is often used in government announcements and publications.
* Yiddish: The language of Ashkenazi Jews in the diaspora and the second most widely spoken Jewish language, Yiddish is linguistically related to German, but incorporates elements of Hebrew. Banned during Israel’s early statehood, Yiddish has undergone a cultural revival in recent years. Furthermore, Yiddish has always and is still regularly used in some haredi Ashkenazi communities. However, despite state-sponsored initiatives for preserving Yiddish culture, the number of Yiddish-speaking Israelis is in decline as older generations of Ashkenazi Jews pass away.
* Ladino: The Sephardi Jewish language and the third most widely spoken Jewish language, Ladino is a variant of medieval Spanish, intermixed with Hebrew. It is spoken by many Sephardi Jews. Today there is a state-supported authority for preserving the Ladino culture.
* Polish: No longer spoken widely in Israel, Polish was spoken by the large number of immigrants from Poland. Today, it is somewhat common in Polish "moshavei ovdim" (workers’ settlements) created during the 1940s and 1950s.
* Ukrainian: While most Ukrainian Jews also speak Russian, there is still a significant segment of Ukrainian speakers.
* Spanish: Spanish is spoken by Jews from Argentina and other olim from other Spanish-speaking countries, as well as by some Sephardi groups. Spanish is not restricted to Sephardim, as most Argentinian Jews are actually Ashkenazim. Spanish has recently been introduced in many schools’ curricula in lieu of French.
* French: Spoken by many Moroccan, Algerian, and Tunisian Jews, either as a native or second language of these francized Maghrebi Jews, French is also spoken by the increasing number of new immigrants from France and other French-speaking countries, as well as by foreign workers from western Africa. For many years French had been the diplomatic language of Israel, and it is still taught in many Israeli schools. The French embassy’s "Institut Français" supports French studies in Israeli schools.
* Italian: In addition to being spoken by Italian Jews, Italian is also spoken by many Jews from Libya (a former Italian colony) as a primary or second language.
* Persian: Persian is spoken by many former Persian Jews, who immigrated from Iran, and their children.
* Kayla and Qwara: These languages are spoken by Ethiopian Jews in addition to Amharic.
* Chinese, Tagalog, and Thai: While spoken by a negligible number of Israeli Jews, Chinese, Tagalog, and Thai have made inroads in Israeli society in recent years due to an influx of non-Jewish immigrants from China, the Philippines, and Thailand. It is estimated that there are 180,000 such illegal immigrants.Fact|date=September 2007 Many (though mostly Vietnamese) legally entered the country when Israel opened their doors to “boat people” from war-torn Southeast Asia in the 1970s.Fact|date=September 2007
* Marathi: Marathi is the language of Jews from the west coast of India who immigrated to Israel after its founding.
* Bukhori: Bukhori is spoken by the Bukharian Jews who immigrated from Central Asia.

References and footnotes

ee also

* Demographics of Israel

External links

* [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_country.asp?name=IL Languages of Israel] – Ethnologue entry for Israel.
* [http://www.biu.ac.il/hu/lprc/home Language Policy Research Center] , Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel.