It is common to hear that Israel treats its Arab minority poorly, and treats the Arabs of the West Bank and Gaza worse. Jimmy Carter limited his description of "apartheid" to the West Bank and Gaza, but others have applied it to Israel. Jewish leftists from Israel and elsewhere are leading some of the tunes, and joining others as a chorus.
Reality is different.
The dirty word "apartheid" does not belong. The barriers between Israelis and Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza reflect violence against Israeli civilians, and not racism. Within Israel, there are too many Arabs studying in Israeli universities and living alongside Jews to justify the term apartheid other than as an anti-Semitic screed.
There are gaps in opportunity between Jews and Arabs in Israel, but they are largely the responsibility of the Arabs themselves. And the problems of Arabs in the West Bank and Gaza likewise reflect Arab more than Jewish activity.
The common problem of Israeli Arabs and Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza is a failure to recognize the legitimacy of Israel, and to participate with it. Rather than cooperating politically for mutual benefits, both groups of Arabs persist in extreme rejection. Palestinians hold onto keys to doors that no longer exist, and demand the return to conditions before 1948. They and Israeli Arabs deny any responsibility for the fate that befell them, and cling to a sense of having a monopoly of justice. Instead of accepting a decent offer, or its sweetening in the summer and fall of 2000, Palestinians embarked on an intifada. Rather than accept as a partial success the withdrawal of settlements from Gaza, they persisted in rocket attacks. These responses have earned them the deepened distrust of Israelis, and helped produce a government that is not inclined to offer the same deals as its predecessors.
Israeli Arabs have not learned the lesson of American minorities, i.e., to play within the system and exchange political support for material benefits. Most of the Arabs elected to the Knesset persist in harsh criticism from outside the major parties, rather than deals negotiated from inside. The Palestinians of Jerusalem refuse even to participate in local elections. They give up the opportunity to select a third of the local council and be a deciding factor in the mayor's election. As a result, they live in neighborhoods with substandard facilities.
When asked why they do not cooperate with the Israeli establishment, the Arab mantra is that cooperation is bound to fail due to Israeli racism.
No one should claim that it will be easy to overcome Jewish suspicion associated decades of Arab incitement and violence. Nevertheless, one can find encouraging instances of reward for cooperation. My best personal story is about an MA student who stopped writing his thesis in order to accept a position as Israel's scientific attache×™ in Germany. He had the help of an uncle who was a Labor Party member of Knesset and Deputy Minister of Health. If there was a bit of patronage in the selection, the man deserved the appointment. He was a scientist who spoke German. His PhD in biology came from Heidelberg University, and he was working as a scientist in the Agriculture Ministry when he began studying for an MA in public policy.
I've noted in previous letters that Israeli Arabs live better than American minorities. On measures of health they do better than the American white majority.
This does not keep Israeli Arabs from feeling out of the mainstream. I have traded stories of having to say the Lord's Prayer as a child in an American public school with a faculty friend who says that he feels good whenever he sees a street sign in Arabic.
The status of American Jews is nothing like it was 60 or even 30 years ago. Jews are presidents of universities that had Jewish quotas, and are at the top of corporations and government departments that would have excluded them completely or limited their opportunities.
If Israeli Arabs or Palestinians are to have similar experiences as Jews in the United States, they will have to shed their backward looking leaders. This will be difficult insofar as politicians and media throughout the Middle East continue to convey their stories of Israeli evil. Repressive regimes invest heavily in preserving Palestinian misery as a way of making themselves look good to their own people. It will not be easy for Israeli Arabs and Palestinians to stop languishing in their tales of suffering, and pursue benefits. The shift may elude yet additional generations. Until it happens, Jews as well as Arabs will suffer.
Ira Sharkansky (Emeritus)
Department of Political Science
Hebrew University
Jerusalem, Israel
Tel: +972-2-532-2725
email: msira@mscc.huji.ac.il