Since its inception, Israel has tried to present itself to the world as a modern state that brings all Jews under one umbrella, a unified state where everyone is equal before the law. But behind this image, the layers of society continued to function as a solid pyramid, preserving the idea of superiority at its peak and letting degrees of discrimination cascade towards the bottom.
At the top of the pyramid stand the Ashkenazi; the European elite who inherited the keys to government, military and media, controlled the economy, and monopolized major institutions for decades. Their income is 36% higher than the Easterners, and their senior positions are twice the representation of others.
Below this peak stand the Mizrahim, Jews of the East who were promised to be part of the chosen people only to discover later that they were a marginalized class. Since the 1950s, Yemeni children were kidnapped from them for adoption by Ashkenazi families, then treated as manual laborers and kept away from higher education.
Then comes the class of Falasha, Ethiopian Jews who were received with promises of return to the land, only to discover later that their Judaism needed retesting. They were forced into ritual washing and received birth control injections without sufficient knowledge.
From the top of the pyramid to its base, society manages its internal cohesion through these layers, where discrimination transforms from a passing incident to a rule that maintains the pyramid's shape as it is: a stable elite at the top, separating distances in the middle, and many feet moving at the bottom to keep the structure standing.
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