Subscribe to Print Edition | Thu., October 11, 2007 , | | Israel Time: 21:53 (EST+7)
Haaretz israel news English
web haaretz.com
  Back to Homepage
Print Edition
Diplomacy
Defense Arts & Leisure Real Estate Jewish World National Advertising
Magazine Week's End Business Opinion Rosner's Domain Anglo File Books Travel
del.icio.us
Digg It!  new
Last update - 10:19 17/08/2007
Arabs in distress
By Nazir Majali

Two leading figures spoke out last week in a way that is hurtful to the Arab public in Israel. The first is "everyone's" President Shimon Peres and the second is Public Security Minister Avi Dichter. In the president's name, a good and serious plan for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was published here ("Olmert and Peres: Palestinian state on 100% of West Bank, with swaps," August 7), but it includes a most peculiar provision that proposes exchanges of territory between Israel inside the 1967 borders and the Palestinian state that will arise - which clearly also applies to Israeli-Arab locales that will be assigned to be part of this state, if they agree.

The writers of the article explained that in his proposal, Peres intended to mollify Yisrael Beiteinu so it would not resign from the coalition. However, he was not thinking about the Arabs of Israel, the vast majority of whom want to remain part of the State of Israel. And not only for geographical reasons. When the proposal to "open the exit door" comes from a person like Peres, of all people, whom many see as the last of the peace prophets, this is taken as further proof that "they don't want us." We can all imagine what the results of a thought like this are.

By way of contrast, Dichter, in his appearance at a Kadima rally in Shfaram, complained of the separatism that the Arabs of Israel are nurturing and wanted the Arab population of Israel to be "Israeli Arabs and not Palestinian Arabs." Dichter, who used to be head of the Shin Bet security service, has pretensions of knowing Arabic better than any Arab. But his knowledge has not prevented him from understanding that there is a problem with our belonging to the Palestinian people: Being Arabs is fine and dandy, but being Palestinians is forbidden - this is separatism.
Advertisement
This is astounding. Does the learned minister not know that our belonging to the Palestinian people is an historical and even genetic fact? After all, there isn't an Arab-Israeli family that doesn't have relatives of the first or second degree in the territories or the Palestinian diaspora. And the entire Palestinian people, including us, the Arabs of Israel, is part of the Arab nation. Moreover, if a government minister who is supposedly conversant with the Arab issue thinks like this, why should he complain of the groups of fanatics and extremists who are inciting against us? In the best case, this is scornful and hurtful. And in any case, precisely a position like this impels us to separatism.

The Arabs of Israel are Arabs and they are Palestinians; this does not detract from them being Israelis and there is no need to alarm the Jews. The fact that they are Arabs, like the fact that they are Palestinians, has never been and will never be a problem for the State of Israel; the opposite is the case. It is with good reason that the state institutions have always made use of this for outside consumption: Both Peres and Dichter have often boasted to their foreign colleagues that there are Arab citizens in Israel.

The Arabs of Israel have not sufficiently been made use of in the attempts to achieve peace between their country and their people and their nation. Being part of the former and part of both of the latter, they can contribute a great deal. In the long term, the Arabs of Israel, being Israelis, can contribute to the reinforcement of the state's national strength. But the primary condition for this is the recognition of them and their status, giving them the feeling that they are part of the state, and that they are desired and permanent, not temporary.

The writer is a correspondent on Israeli issues in the Arabic media.
Bookmark to del.icio.us
Bad publicity
Tiv Taam is fighting for public opinion in order to counter a consumer affairs T.V. show.
The biggest stage
For the first time in its history, Maccabi Tel Aviv will play against the New York Knicks.
  1.   You`re Not Israelis. 10:44  |  Terry 17/08/07
  2.   Respectively...this is rubbish 10:44  |  FOX 17/08/07
  3.   Only if Arab Muslims feel part of a JEWISH state 10:55  |  AV 17/08/07
  4.   The plain truth 10:56  |  sweis Melbourne 17/08/07
  5.   Our leaders, Nazir Majali, don`t need to share with us, Israeli 10:59  |  Raanan Cohen 17/08/07
  6.   Israeli Arabs are part of the problem- not the solution 11:01  |  Dani 17/08/07
  7.   Arab Israelis are no more welcome then Arab Arabs 11:17  |  Natallie Durson 17/08/07
  8.   Israeli Arabs are not constructs 11:21  |  Margie in Tel Aviv 17/08/07
  9.   # 6 Dani: Fifth Column? 11:24  |  Natallie Durson 17/08/07
  10.   this constant kissing up to 11:36  |  Jew 17/08/07
  11.   Let them choose 11:38  |  Bo 17/08/07
  12.   Bo 11:54  |  Margie in Tel Aviv 17/08/07
  13.   Cretin Durson,Ames Aldrich and Hanson were russkie spies 11:55  |  Absolute Sweden 17/08/07
  14.   Arabs, make your way out of distress 11:57  |  paravoz 17/08/07
  15.   Natallie Durson 12:10  |  Angelique 17/08/07
  16.   Your Islam religion calls for no tolerance to "infidels". 12:16  |  IRC 17/08/07
  17.   Jewish state 12:28  |  Mikael 17/08/07
  18.   A PLO state in Yesha will spread the terror inside the Green Line 12:38  |  Manhigut Yehudit 17/08/07
  19.   Margie in Tel Aviv - I beg your pardon 12:41  |  Bo 17/08/07
  20.   discriminated turn discriminators 12:45  |  ravi 17/08/07
  21.   Israeli Arabs / Palestinians 12:46  |  Paul Sandler 17/08/07
  22.   It is time to seriously consider drawing the future 12:49  |  Yehudah Israeli 17/08/07
  23.   #9 Natallie Durson: Yes- 5th column 12:57  |  Dani 17/08/07
  24.   Parovoz back to Kolomna! 13:04  |  Andreas 17/08/07
  25.   #14 paravoz 13:04  |  Martin 17/08/07
  26.   #16 IRC in Birmingham - Want some quotes? 13:07  |  Terry 17/08/07
  27.   #17 Mikael 13:09  |  Martin 17/08/07
  28.   #20 Ravi 13:23  |  Martin 17/08/07
  29.   Bo 13:27  |  Margie in Tel Aviv 17/08/07
  30.   Given and regected 13:32  |  Dr David I. Gross 17/08/07
  31.   #8 fake Margie 13:39  |  Ben 17/08/07
  32.   #19 Bo 13:41  |  Labhras 17/08/07
  33.   They are the avant-garde of the one state solution 13:50  |  Fritz 17/08/07
  34.   # 6 you`re right dani, but just a part... 13:58  |  eric 17/08/07
  35.   The idea of moving whole villages 13:58  |  Natan and Liora 17/08/07
  36.   #26 Quotes 14:07  |  IRC 17/08/07
  37.   Natalie Durson, shallow at best #7 14:10  |  FOX 17/08/07
  38.   The Israeli Arab way is to suck up to the enemy 14:10  |  Maimon 17/08/07
  39.   I disagree 14:12  |  indrajaya 17/08/07
  40.   Makael`s misnomer #17 14:19  |  FOX 17/08/07
  41.   I consider you Israeli 14:23  |  Israeli guy 17/08/07
  42.   Bassakwards as usual 14:38  |  David Teich 17/08/07
  43.   People, don`t you believe in fairness & reciprocity? 14:39  |  Terry 17/08/07
  44.   Re: 27 14:50  |  Mikael 17/08/07
  45.   Re: Makael`s misnomer #17 15:07  |  Mikael 17/08/07
  46.   #36 IRC 15:07  |  Martin 17/08/07
  47.   Bo RE: MARGIE #12 15:10  |  GABE1 17/08/07
  48.   #37 Indrajaya 15:10  |  Martin 17/08/07
  49.   indrajaya, so you finally agree with many of us, Israelis, 15:13  |  Eitan 17/08/07
  50.   #34 eric spells out the nuttiest post ive seen yet !! 15:14  |  victor hardman 17/08/07
  51.   IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH PEACE, COMPLETELY A DIFFERENT ISSUE 15:17  |  indrajaya 17/08/07
  52.   #34 ERIC THE PSEUDO ARAB WRITES ON ROCKS 15:18  |  paul harris 17/08/07
  53.   Better Peace Apart 15:20  |  Shalom Freedman 17/08/07
  54.   #36 IRC in Birmingham - Not just quotes. 15:22  |  Terry 17/08/07
  55.   indrajaya! 15:26  |  Maimon 17/08/07
  56.   No. 1 Terry 15:30  |  steve 17/08/07
  57.   It`s not rational to expect Israeli Arabs to be loyal to Israel. 15:40  |  Chaim 17/08/07
  58.   Terry 15:46  |  Tareq 17/08/07
  59.   Peace with the Arabs starts at home 15:57  |  Rami 17/08/07
  60.   If only it were true, but you have shown it to be false 15:58  |  McQueen 17/08/07
  61.   They should accept redrawn lines.They are an obstacle to peace 15:59  |  McQueen 17/08/07
  62.   If Israel were attacked and Arab towns were conquered, what then? 16:03  |  McQueen 17/08/07
  63.   Mikael and `should` and `must` 16:05  |  Jasmine Murphy 17/08/07
  64.   #35 Natan & Liora 16:09  |  Rami 17/08/07
  65.   Ben 16:09  |  Margie in Tel Aviv 17/08/07
  66.   THE CYPRUS MODEL or THE UNITED STATES OF ISRAEL (Part Two) 16:12  |  Atilla Karagozoglu 17/08/07
  67.   Margie in Tel Aviv 16:15  |  GABE1 17/08/07
  68.   Margie in Tel Aviv 16:17  |  GABE1 17/08/07
  69.   Bo # 11 16:20  |  ChanahS 17/08/07
  70.   Margie -The SO CALLED PERSONAL ATTACK 16:21  |  GABE1 17/08/07
  71.   # 16 IRC birmingham the lying bigot 16:23  |  ChanahS 17/08/07
  72.   Mikael # 17 16:26  |  ChanahS 17/08/07
  73.   Re. Jasmine Murphy 16:27  |  Mikael 17/08/07
  74.   Rami from Nazareth, that is exactly the point: Enabling people in 16:27  |  Reut Ami-Ram 17/08/07
  75.   Atilla 16:36  |  Margie bargie 17/08/07
  76.   Land exchange 16:44  |  17 17/08/07
  77.   #57 ChanahS 16:47  |  IRC 17/08/07
  78.   IRC # 16 16:48  |  Harah Yaakov Harel 17/08/07
  79.   Terry # 40 16:51  |  Rami 17/08/07
  80.   Mikael about the Jewish State 16:59  |  Reut Ami-Ram 17/08/07
  81.   Re:67 16:59  |  Mikael 17/08/07
  82.   jewish with state arab minority or binational non jewish state 17:03  |  zionist forever 17/08/07
  83.