Druze win reprieve from merger of local authorities
By Yair Ettinger
After a month-long public campaign against the plan to unite four Druze local authorities in the Galilee, the government has agreed to reconsider the plan. In a meeting with Druze leaders yesterday, the director-general of the Prime Minister's Office, Avigdor Yitzhaki, said that the elections scheduled for the unified council would be postponed for three to four months in an effort to reach a compromise solution.
Advertisement
The plan to unify the Druze localities is part of an ambitious government to save millions of shekels by streamlining local government.
The protest by the four localities - Yanuh-Jat, Yarka, Julis and Abu Snan - began in early August with a demonstration outside of the Prime Minister's Office. There were violent clashes at this demonstration that injured a number of police officers and demonstrators.
The campaign continued throughout the month, with a number of additional demonstrations and meetings. Last week, the Druze religious leader Sheikh Muwafik Tarif announced that the residents of the four localities would boycott the elections for the unified authority. Tarif, a resident of Julis, was a member of the Druze delegation that met with Yitzhaki yesterday.
As the delegation met in the Prime Minister's Office yesterday, hundreds of residents of the villages slated for unification demonstrated outside the government complex. The police were out in force to prevent any disorder, and linked arms closely to form a human barrier. The demonstration proceeded without any disturbances, as the protestors chanted "No to the merger, yes to our rights." They carried signs with slogans equating the planned unification with "transfer" and warned that the government's plan signaled the end to the "alliance of blood" the Druze community has forged with the State of Israel.
The Prime Minister's Office said that government officials will meet with representatives of the four local authorities and will try to accommodate their wishes "if possible."
The Druze delegation said after the meeting that Yitzhaki promised to discuss their demands with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon during his trip to India. According to the Druze representatives, the director-general of the PMO explained that the plan was brought to the Knesset for approval in July under the assumption that the residents did not object to the merger plan. (The residents of two other Druze localities, Daliat al-Carmel and Isifiya, are not objecting to the plan to unite their adjacent villages.)
The delegation was greeted with cheers from the demonstrators after emerging from the Prime Minister's Office and announcing the "optimistic and positive" agreement reached with Yitzhaki.
The protestors also expressed their appreciation to police officers for their role in allowing the demonstration to proceed peacefully.
Haaretz.com, the online edition of Haaretz Newspaper in Israel, offers real-time breaking news, opinions and analysis from Israel and the Middle East. Haaretz.com provides extensive and in-depth coverage of Israel, the Jewish World and the Middle East, including defense, diplomacy, the Arab-Israeli conflict, the peace process, Israeli politics, Jerusalem affairs, international relations, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, the Palestinian Authority, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, the Israeli business world and Jewish life in Israel and the Diaspora.
