Canadian gets three months in jail for not serving in Israeli army
Gorelik was detained in Israel after she arrived in the country on Labour Day weekend to attend her cousin’s wedding. Gorelik, a 30-year-old with dual Canadian-Israeli citizenship, left Israel for Toronto with her family when she was 17. All Israeli citizens are required to start mandatory service in the Israeli Defense Forces at 18 unless they receive an exemption.
*Question
1. Did she enter Israel on a Canadian Passport or not?
I have mixed feeling about dual nationality. One problem is many countries don’t even allow renounciation or make it very difficult.
If you think being a Canadian slave is bad, imagine if you were an Israeli jew-slave.
*Sorry, but I fail to see the relevance of this story. Dual citizenship is a reality around the world and the Canadian government, for one, warns naturalized Canadian citizens that Canada may not be able to protect them if they get into trouble when visiting their country of origin.
@Tim, It’s mandatory for Israeli citizens to use an Israeli passport to enter the country, even if they have also nationality and passport of another country. Some years ago there was an incident where the first lady of Iceland, who is British and Israeli, tried to enter Israel only with her British passport. After a confrontation with the immigration officer she was eventually allowed to enter the country, but the incident caused a minor diplomatic complaint.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3266229,00.html
Yana Gorelik’s case is a technicality. Although Israeli military service only begins after the person turns 18, she was required to register with the military at 16. I guess she did that and then left the country at 17 with her family. Since her service hadn’t started yet, it would have been fine if she had simply reported to an Israeli consulate that she was living abroad. In that case she would have been allowed to postpone military service as long as she remained residing abroad. The requirement would cease when she turned 21, got married or had a child. During that period she would have even been allowed to visit Israel for four months per year without being subject to military service.
http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/About+the+Ministry/Consular_affairs/Israel_Defense_Forces.htm
http://www.idfinfo.co.il/Ben_Mehager.php?cat=8
I feel this was a disproportional punishment, but I think she and her family should have been more careful with the requirements to legally avoid Israeli military service. Unlike FBAR, it’s widely known in Israeli society that both men and women are required to serve.
*This is part of the price you pay for having dual citizenship. I don’t know what information may be printed in Canadian passports, but “Important Information” iterm number 14 printed in US passports reads as follows:
14. DUAL CITIZENS: A person who has dual citizenship in more than one country at the same time is considered a dual citizen. A dual citizen my be subject to the laws of the other country that considers that person its citizen while in that country’s jurisdiction, INCLUDING CONSCRIPTION FOR MILITARY SERVICE…… ”
Is there any information like this in Canadian passports?
I am personally aware of Argentine citizens who have become US citizens being conscripted for military service when they have returned to Argentina temporarily to visit relatives. Until recently Argentina did not allow its citizens to renounce Argenrtine citizenshp. Today it is possible, but the person renouncing must personally present hiself or herself at a speific Argentine Government office in Buenos Aires in order to do so.
Dual citizenship may have its conveniences for certain purposes, but it can also have its inconveniences. Americans living abroad are becoming very aware of the dual tax obligation they must bear if they retain their US citizenship. In the case of persons with dual US cirtizenship they are subject to US tax laws even when they are NOT within the jurisdiction of the Unirted States.
@Roger, This must be old news because Argentina doesn’t have mandatory military service since 1995. Also, Argentina allows dual citizens to enter the country with a passport of the other country’s nationality as long as it states Argentina as the place of birth.
This also happens to South Korean citizens who come back for a visit.
There have been many stories about dual citizens who don’t even speak the language who arrive as tourists and are immediately drafted and end up spending 2 years in the military.
“are immediately drafted and end up spending 2 years in the military.”
So many are slaves and yet refuse to recognize it, so pervasive is the propaganda.
@Roger Back page of Canadian passport says:
“Canadian citizens who have more than one nationality through birth, descent, marriage or naturalization are advised that, while in the country of their other nationality, they may be subject to all its laws and obligations particularly military service.”
The problem is the print is small and in light blue lettering on a similar-blue textured background so it’s not easy to read. (Not sure who came up with that print layout and why, but it’s not a good one.) Also, I suspect far too many passport holders never read the fine print on the back cover of their passports.
I believe that for some time US passports have had print on the back cover warning US citizens living abroad that they have to file tax returns, but I may be wrong on that as I’ve never had a US passport in my life, have only seen others’ passports but I think I’ve seen that. I believe the US passport also warns that you are required to leave and re-enter the US on a US passport … but again, how many people read this stuff. And how readable is it? The problem is, it’s your passport, you signed the thing, and it wouldn’t be easy to argue in front of any judge that you didn’t know what is printed inside it – the obvious reply is, “well it was your responsibility to read it, wasn’t it?”
And re the passport warnings – lots of people never get passports, and it is only recently that we needed one to enter the US.
And if we’re basically prevented from renouncing – because the process is so fraught with peril – then it makes no sense to place the onus on the dual to do so. Should the individual have to satisfy the demands of a state who they only have some random relationship with – that was involuntary? Why not say that to take up an inherited citizenship, that they must proactively come forward by a certain age, and choose to keep it? At this rate, the state can enact anything – for any reason, and tie it to involuntary citizenship, and the individual abroad is effectively a captive.
I consider mandatory conscription to be slavery just as much as citizenship-based taxation is. I think something like over 1000 people renounce citizenship in Singapore yearly for this reason alone, which is a huge number when you consider the population of Singapore compared to the US.
I think alot of the fuss over dual citizenship though is a lot of hot air. As long as the second country doesn’t tax based on your nationality or have mandatory conscription there are few downsides to having it, bar running for public office in one of the two countries. The only issue for me as a dual EU citizen (yes, that is rather getting more and more redundant) is that I have to spend money to maintain two sets of passports. I similarly have many friends who have dual EU- Canadian, Australian or New Zealand citizenship and they all have had absolutely no issues.
@Badger You probably already know this, maybe other readers don’t. Back in the 60s and70s some US-citizen parents living in Canada and probably elsewhere registered their Canadian (or elsewhere) born kids with a US consulate or embassy, even if the parents themselves weren’t exactly fond of the US and had no intention of returning there, in order to “give the kids a choice when they’re adults.” There was a widespread (and now, perhaps retroactively I’m not sure) inaccurate belief that the kids wouldn’t become Americans unless they took their own steps to do so upon reaching the age of 18. There was also the belief that if you didn’t register your kids, they wouldn’t be considered Americans or ever have that “opportunity.”
Now of course we know that the US considers such children to be US citizens even if they’ve never set foot in the US as adults and as adults (or children) never had any connection with the US beyond the misfortune of having one or both parents who were US citizens at the time of the childrens’ births. Never mind having made their own choice as adults as to whether they want USC. And this is so, regardless of whether the child was registered.
The really sad, sick part of this is that at least some of these apparent changes in US policy are the direct result of lobbying by organizations like American Citizens Abroad to make the “benefits” of USC automatic to anyone born of US parents living outside the US. Even the lastest submission by Swiss-resident Americans asks for this. And as far as I am aware, this “benefit” isn’t being asked for conditionally upon the wish of the child once an adult, which IMO is outrageous. Most of the US-born Canadian citizens I know who registered their kids at a US embassy or consulate would NEVER have done so, if they’d believed or known their kids would have no say in the matter of USC once they were adults. They didn’t register their kids because they wanted them to be Americans; they thought they were doing their kids a favour by giving them a choice they genuinely believed that the children, as adults, might not otherwise have. Rather than deny them that choice (believing non-registering would be a denial of that choice) without their consent.
@Schubert, @ Badger, @All,
Agree, agree, agree. Just think of how many this affects with the consequences. What is wrong with choice? These children should not be locked in!
Does anyone else feel as if “citizenship” in and of itself has significantly lost a lot of its lustre over the past few decades? Beforehand most countries blocked dual citizenship and made those born overseas jump through many hoops to obtain their parents’ nationalities. Having US or any other first world citizenship was a real mark of pride and you had to fight to maintain your citizenship overseas. Even tiny Belgium made those resident overseas “phone home” every ten years or they would automatically lose their citizenship.
Nowadays you have everyone and their mother falling over eachother to practically sell permanent residency to whomever is willing to invest some money and many people have not only dual citizenship, but 3 or more nationalities. Perhaps the economic crisis has sped up the demise, but it certainly seems as if citizenship has quickly become more of an economic asset or liability to its holders and has much less of an emotional meaning or that “special something” that seemed to be present just a decade ago.
yeah, and the US devalued it A LOT imho, by making it so hard to give up. Citizenship is basically just a concept of “self protection” for most countries and people. Think about how disruptive it is in the US where the Hispanic minority (for now) conducts business in Spanish. It’s easy to see the result of this! There’s a lot of people against illegal immigration, but the government wants to keep them there, hence Obama’s recent amnesty plan.
I’ve also read online that in places like Vietnam and Thailand, where the populations are 99% the same ethnic group, it’s next-to-impossible to naturalise in places like this if you were born into a different ethnic group. So maybe racism and fear plays a part in it as well.
At least for me, I’m starting to indentify less and less with any specific nationality. A passport is just to travel. I prefer to stay neutral in all things. The only thing that has me “pegged” is that I was born in the US, so people will always say that I’m American, even if I have a CLN stamped onto my t-shirt. Maybe this is why the Jews have been successful for thousands of years: they identified more with their own ethnic group and didn’t get involved so much with the trivial aspects of the host culture. An outside perspective can be to one’s advantage!
Considering US Citizenship, I sometimes wonder who renounced and then actually asked for it back? I’ve searched and searched, but I can’t find anything, not even random statements. The consulates say it’s final, but the same DoS form, I believe, is used also for “reninstatement” of citizenship.
Only example that I know of is the pro-Puerto Rican indenpendence campaigner Mari Bras, who successfully renounced US citizenship overseas but later had it overturned (not voluntary). He argued that a separate Puerto Rican citizenship existed, which has in fact been reaffirmed by subsequent court decisions – They even issue certificates of Puerto Rican citizenship nowadays and view it as not connected to US citizenship – A view which the US State Department doesn’t quite agree with of course…!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Mari_Bras#U.S._citizenship_renunciation
Opinion piece re the pitfalls of holding dual citizenship-
(addressing military service, but not US extraterritorial taxation issues):
http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/abolish-dual-citizenship.premium-1.469416
Another article:
http://www.nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/national/12-Oct-2012/rabbani-for-revoking-dual-citizenship-agreement-with-us
I agree that taking the Oath of Allegiance pretty much implies that you implicity renounce your original citizenship.
Even if the US has dual citizenship agreements with many countries, they do not encourage people to become dual citizens. On the U.S. department of state web site, it explicitly says:
“The U.S. Government recognizes that dual nationality exists but does not encourage it as a matter of policy because of the problems it may cause. Claims of other countries on dual national U.S. citizens may conflict with U.S. law, and dual nationality may limit U.S. Government efforts to assist citizens abroad. The country where a dual national is located generally has a stronger claim to that person’s allegiance.“
By the way, how do you guys quote articles in gray. I haven’t figured out how to do it with the toolbar provided when you create new posts.
Hi, Christophe,
Quoting something: Highlight and then hit ” quote (“) ” in the Bold, Italic, etc. buttons above where you type in the content of your post. Give that a try.
Were it as easy as taking the ‘Oath of Allegiance’ as relinquishing your former citizenship! It can, in many instances, be so claimed, but he US has certainly thrown roadblocks in there to make it difficult. And, f course, onever, never, should anyone do anything to put themselves back into the realm of US citizenship.