Arab Rights

On April 28^th, Meretz USA hosted BUSTAN Director Raed Al-Mickawi for a discussion on the difficulties faced by Bedouin living in the Negev and on the work of BUSTAN. 

BUSTAN is an Israeli nonprofit and social justice organization which works to develop sustainable and equitable resource allocation for all citizens of the Negev.  It works in particular to with marginalized Bedouin communities to minimize the impacts of urbanization, overpopulation, and over-consumption, and addresses these problems by building sustainable and environmentally friendly community infrastructure.

Raed began his talk with a history of the Bedouin in the Negev, then addressed some of the issues that the communities are now facing, and finally elaborated on some of the ways that BUSTAN is working to resolve these issues. 

Prior to the 1950s, Raed explained, the Bedouin lived a nomadic lifestyle, moving throughout the Negev.  In the 50s, however, Israel confiscated these lands and moved 60% of the community into the small triangle of land between the cities of Arad, Yerucham, and Beersheva, and area that makes up 2% of the land in the Negev.  The reason for this move was that the Israeli government needed the land for military training. 

Since that time, the Israeli government has established nine recognized townships and the Bedouin have settled into 45 additional unrecognized villages - although 9 of these are in the process of being recognized.  None of these living situations is without immense hardship.

Illustrating with slides, Raed explained that the unrecognized villages receive no services from the state of Israel.  They have no electricity, no running water, no sewage, and no trash is collected.  The residents of these villages get rid of their trash by burning, but this causes disease. 

In addition, the government says that these villages are illegal, that they've been built on state land and that the residents should resettle in the recognized communities.  The houses there are, thus, continually subject to the threat of bulldozing.   

However, circumstances are not really better in the townships.  Many townships are also subject to environmental health hazards and resource shortages.  Industrial zones built next to villages cause high rates of cancer and asthma.  Raed's village, Tel Sheva, the first township to be established by the Israeli government in 1967, experiences both water and electrical shortages - despite being located next to a power plant.

There is also little opportunity for the future for those living in the townships, where unemployment rates hover at 90% and crime and drugs thrive.  Calling the towns "ghetto-like", Raed attributed these problems largely to a lack of urban planning on the part of the Israeli government.  The townships have no town centers or agricultural land, which could provide employment opportunities and goods to the communities. 

In fact, Raed explained, opportunities for employment and success are so few in the townships, that there is a sense within the Bedouin community that it is better to live in the unrecognized villages.  Moving to the townships almost inevitably means becoming unemployed and raising children in a crime-ridden environment. 

BUSTAN's work involves resolving these issues for the Bedouin community in the Negev in an environmentally sustainable way.  For instance, some of organization's work in the region focuses primarily on health problems.  In 2003, the organization established a clinic in the unrecognized village of Wadi el Na'am.  The clinic powers itself through "off the grid" technology.  Similarly, BUSTAN provides solar-powered electrical equipment to families with sick children through it's "Children's Power Project."  Raed pointed out that, because the Negev has a very sunny climate, solar power makes more sense than power plants, BUSTAN's "New Energies" project focuses on creating such models of sustainable energy.

BUSTAN's other initiatives are similarly aimed at resource development or at raising awareness.  It's "Learning Sites" project focuses on things like teaching Bedouin women to practice organic farming or giving young Bedouin the tools to build in a sustainable manner.  It's "Negev Unplugged Grassroots Advocacy" project includes tours, lectures, and media events to raise awareness about inequalities in the region, and it's "Health Justice" project works to highlight contaminated areas of the Negev. 

Concluding, Raed explained some of the beliefs underlying Bustan's work.  He stressed the idea that the Israeli-Arab conflict, like so many other conflicts across the globe, is based on a fight for resources.  By stressing the importance of sustainable development, BUSTAN hopes to eliminate one reason that people fight.  He also explained that BUSTAN's work allows both Jewish and Arab volunteers to come together and to find solutions to a nonpolitical matter.  These volunteers begin working on a project like building a health clinic, and through these interactions they are able to begin discussions and to find common ground on more difficult issues. 

Michal Radoshitzky

In reading Israeli newspapers’ special Yom Ha’atzmaut editions, one could not miss the contrast between nostalgic accounts of Israel’s miraculous achievements in its history and the sober reality in which Israeli society is submerged today. Reading the words of leading Israeli commentators reinforced my understanding that my society is very much aware of the fact that we are destined to live on the same stretch of land with our Palestinian neighbors. Neither they nor we have any plans of setting up a home for ourselves elsewhere. Simultaneously however, we Israelis see the democratic character of our state as crucial. We also envision Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people – a state with a Jewish majority that treats its minorities as equal citizens. ...

ISRAEL HORIZONS - Spring 2006 

AN APARTHEID STATE? Israel is a democracy in which Arabs vote

By Benjamin Pogrund

The word "apartheid" became widely known through the South African election in 1948 as the expression of Afrikaner nationalist policy. It can be defined as racial separation and discrimination, institutionalised by law in every aspect of everyday life.

The description of Israel as an “emerging apartheid state” began during the regional conferences leading up to the UN anti-racism conference in Durban in August/September 2001. The anti-racism conference of NGOs adopted resolutions condemning Israel as an “apartheid state” and calling for an international policy of total isolation, “as in the case of South Africa which means the imposition of mandatory and comprehensive sanctions and embargoes (and) the full cessation of all links….” There were also repeated references to “genocide” in descriptions of Israel’s behavior towards Palestinians, plus denunciations of Zionism, Israel’s founding philosophy, as “racism,” in a transparent attempt to reinstate the now rescinded 1975 UN resolution condemning Zionism.

The conference of governments that immediately followed the NGO meeting rejected virtually every one of the attacks on Israel. Later, South Africa’s deputy foreign minister, Aziz Pahad, spoke of the “disgraceful events” surrounding the NGO conference and said: “I wish to make it unequivocally clear that the South African government recognises that part of that component was hijacked and used by some with an anti-Israel agenda to turn it into an anti-Semitic event.”

So, how does Israel stand in regard to the apartheid and racist claims?

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By Miriam Felton-Dansky

In 1995, a registered nurse named Aadal Kaadan – along with his wife, Iman, an elementary school teacher, and their three daughters – decided to leave the Israeli-Arab village of Baka el-Gharbiyyah for more land and a better lifestyle in Katzir, a small Jewish town near Carmiel. Though the Kaadans were willing to pay the price of $15,000, their application was denied, because the dunams in question belonged to the Jewish National Fund in Israel, the Keren Kayemet Leyisrael (KKL), whose mandate is to purchase and protect land for the Jewish people. So even though the land was administered by the Israel Land Authority (ILA – also known as the Israel Land Administration) – Israel’s official land-management agent – its ownership by the KKL meant that the ILA would not sell it to the Kaadans, who are not Jews.

Many were troubled by the fact that Israeli citizens were barred from purchasing land because of their ethnicity – since Israel regards itself as a democracy with equality for all citizens. The Association for Civil Rights in Israel, along with Meretz MK Zehava Gal-On, launched a suit on behalf of the Kaadans, and a legal battle ensued, the crux of which was whether the ILA could discriminate in its land sales if the official owner of the land was the JNF. In 2000, the Israeli Supreme Court, referring to the promise in Israel's Declaration of Independence that all citizens of the Jewish state will be equal, ruled that the ILA could not facilitate the discrimination against Arab citizens of Israel by refusing to sell even JNF land to Arab citizens. The case was finally settled in 2005, when a ruling by Attorney General Menachem Mazuz determined that no ILA-managed land, including that owned by the JNF, could be marketed exclusively to Jews. The Kaadans bought their plot at the 1995 price and moved to Katzir.

Although he ruled that the ILA could not discriminate, Mazuz exempted the JNF from this stricture, ruling that the land in question would be officially transferred to the ILA’s holdings and that in exchange, the ILA would transfer an equivalent amount of land to the JNF in a less populated area. The agreement settled the issue, but it raised many others. In the JNF’s view, a sale to the Kaadans would violate its original covenant, which is meant to benefit Jews only. In reality, though, the JNF’s original mandate – acquiring land to establish a Jewish homeland – is long since fulfilled, making the continued adherence to its covenantproblematic. In the name of working toward its original mission, the JNF is actually pursuing a very specific vision of the Jewish state that may not bein the best interest of today's Israel.

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Arab Israelis are full citizens under Israeli law, but they experience discrimination and social exclusion. The question of Arab Israeli’s status in Israel is particularly important for Israeli democracy and the Jewish state: How should Israel balance its Jewish character with equal rights for its Arab citizens?

05/10/07

New York, NY… Meretz USA President Larry Lerner and Chairman Theodore Bikel today announced that Meretz USA, “supports the recent demonstration staged by the Bedouin Sheep Growers Committee.”  Meretz USA, they said, “joins in the protest of the Bedouin’s unequal treatment by the Israeli government, as well as the Israeli government’s reluctance to engage that community in efforts to address its needs.”