A Blood Feud in Israel

Israel’s carefully nourished egalitarian image has been splashed by outrage from a seldom visited corner of society, the Ethiopian Jews. They number 50,000 now, the majority flown in by heroic airlifts in the mid-1980s and early 1990s. Left behind was an African nation where they had faced discrimination as a religious minority. Ahead lay the Jewish homeland, its doors open for waves of migrants from Europe, the Arab world and the former Soviet Union. Each group struggled to find its place in Israeli society, each with notable degrees of success.

But not the Ethiopians. The Absorption Ministry gave them housing, food and clothing--but not enough, or good enough, jobs. They have the vote, and during campaigns politicians from Tel Aviv and Jerusalem trekked to the immigrants’ housing areas to shake hands and be photographed, then returned to the city. They were accepted into the army and served despite complaints that they drew an inordinate share of menial duty.

These difficult rungs on the immigrant ladder are not unusual, and the complaints by the Ethiopians that they, a barely visible minority, were getting the short end of the stick turned few heads. The dark-skinned immigrants did not give in, however, and said that they smelled racism.

Sunday the long years of neglect broke violently into the open, electrified by a newspaper report, later officially confirmed, that blood donations by Ethiopian Israelis had been routinely destroyed on grounds that Ethiopians had a higher incidence of HIV infection, the virus that causes AIDS, than any other ethnic group in Israel. Health authorities say a decision to exclude blood from a particular ethnic or immigrant population is unusual, although the United States had a ban on donations by Haitians and sub-Saharan Africans from 1983 to 1990. For the Ethiopians of Israel, the ban was proof in part of discrimination, whatever the health rationale.

The response was a violent riot outside Prime Minister Shimon Peres’ office in Jerusalem. Thousands took part. Israel was shocked, and the health minister declared that the blood donated by Ethiopians will be frozen, not tossed, until the government comes up with a new blood bank policy.

Well and good, but Israel must also look into the accusations of racism and neglect. The people and officials of Israel cannot reject a people they reached out to save.