Equal Funding for Arab Religious Communities.

Petition filed against the Minister of Religious Affairs (MORA) and the Minister of Finance asking the Court to declare unconstitutional four provisions of the Knesset Budget Law (1998), which allotted only 1.86% of the total $400 million budget of the MORA to Arab religious communities (Muslim, Christian and Druze) combined. Adalah argued that as the Arab minority constitutes about 20% of the population, this disproportionate budget allocation violated the principle of equality. Case dismissed in 12/98 by a 26-page written decision. In its ruling, the Court confirmed that the MORA budget granted to the Arab religious communities constituted prima facie discrimination. However, the Court ruled that the petitioners failed to establish that "substantive inequality" exists; for this, according to the test articulated by the Court for the first time, it is necessary to examine the religious needs of each religious community. Thus, the Court decided that the petition was too general, and that the petitioners' requested remedy - to allocate funds commensurate with the Arab community's percentage of the population - would entail the appropriation of legislative powers by the Court.

(H.C. 240/98, Adalah, et. al. v. Minister of Religious Affairs, et. al., P.D. 52 (2) 167)