Slippery Slope

Police intelligence ordered the categorical targeting of all Israeli Arabs joining social protests. This contrasts with the directives regarding Jewish demonstrators, which focus on rioters and anarchists.

Avigdor Lieberman, deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, directed the ministers in his party, Israel Beiteinu, to refuse to cooperate with the parliamentary committee on integrating Israeli Arabs in Israeli society, headed by Israeli Arab MK Ahmad Tibi (Ta’al).

(Hebrew)

Settlers threw stones at two Israeli Arabs from the north of Israel who drove by mistake to the settlement Yitzhar in a truck. One of the Arabs suffered a mild head injury. The settlers slashed the truck’s tires.

(Hebrew)

Member of Knesset Danny Danon (Likud) said in a meeting of the Knesset Internal Affairs Committee, dedicated to water supply to the Arab-Israeli village of Jisr al Zarqa, that Israeli Arabs are the biggest problem of the State of Israel.

(Hebrew)

The Jisr Az-Zarqa* Junior High School has been closed, due to serious defects in the school building.  Among the defects found were sewage flowing in the school, lack of lighting in classrooms, exposed electrical wires and garbage scattered in the building.

[*Jisr Az-Zarqa is an Israeli Arab local council near Caesarea.]

(Hebrew)

The [Arab] village of Ein Khod in the Carmel has been cut off from the national water supply for two weeks due to a debt to Mekorot, the national water company.

(Hebrew)

WikiLeaks documents reveal that the head of the General Security Service (Shabak or Shin-Bet), Yuval Diskin, is concerned about the people who give Israeli Arabs “bad ideas”, and believes they “abuse their rights”.

According to a study by the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Labor, only about 20% of the Arab academics who majored in Science or Engineering are employed in the areas of their study. This is in spite of the law which prohibits discrimination in getting a job on the basis of ethnicity. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commissioner, attorney Ziona Koenig-Yair, added: “The study reinforces the feeling of the public, that there still is discrimination against the Arab population – a feeling we get also from employers and from employees.”

(Hebrew )