Israel: Arab Citizens

Lord Bishop of Exeter Excerpts

Thursday 13th December 2012 Lords Chamber

Moved By

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

That this House takes note of the issues of equality and discrimination affecting Israel’s Arab citizens.

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

My Lords, we each come to debates such as this with our own personal stories. Mine begins with my father who served with the British Mandate force, and I grew up with his memories and photographs, and a strong sense of the historical and moral responsibility that the UK still carries for where Israelis and Palestinians find themselves today. More directly, I have visited the area regularly for the past 35 years, as a one-time trustee of Christian Aid, as a patron of a range of Israeli and Palestinian human rights organisations and also of BibleLands—now Embrace the Middle East. Additionally, my diocese has a companion link with the Anglican Province of Jerusalem and the Middle East. I have met many people of all communities on the ground, and over the years have witnessed a radical change in the composition and culture of Israeli society, with one element of this being increased inequality and discrimination faced by Israel’s Arab citizens. However, I have also seen directly, and wish publicly to affirm, the work of those organisations, including those that are Israeli, working to combat such discrimination and inequality. A wish to highlight both the problem and the work of those seeking to address it are among the reasons I sought this debate, but there are further reasons for having it now.

All the signs are that we may be reaching the end of any realistic prospect of a genuine two-state solution: the past assumption that progress in the peace process would help improve Arab-Jewish relations within Israel no longer holds. Addressing Israeli-Arab discrimination needs now to be seen as a justice issue in its own right and very much framed within a discourse of civil rights. In 2011, the EU acknowledged that Israel’s treatment of its Arab citizens was a core issue that could not be postponed until the peace process is revived.

Secondly, this debate needs to be set within the context of a mood of democratic awakening across the Middle East. Last year, Israel experienced its own democratic awakening with the 14 July movement. Last year’s activism could lead to a deeper process of political awakening, exposing the oppressive power structures and inequalities at the heart of Israeli society, and ultimately opposing all forms of segregation and injustice, including that experienced by Israeli citizens who are Arabs—a term which here I take to include not only Muslim and Christian Palestinians and Bedouin Arabs, but Arabic speaking Druze and a small number of Circassians as well.

My third reason for requesting this debate now is that next year is the 10th anniversary of Justice Theodore Or’s inquiry into Israeli Arab support for the second intifada which concluded that,

“successive generations of Israel’s government have failed to address in a comprehensive and deep fashion the difficult problems created by the existence of a large Arab minority inside the Jewish state. Government handling of the Arab sector has been primarily neglectful and discriminatory”.

They have not shown,

“sufficient sensitivity to the needs of the Arab sector, nor done enough to give this sector its equal share of state resource. The state did not try hard enough to create equality for its Arab citizens or to uproot discriminatory or unjust practices”.

The nature of such discrimination is well documented. Your Lordships will have seen the excellent briefing pack produced by the Library, and I am grateful for briefings not only from various human rights groups but from the Board of Deputies of British Jews, the UK Task Force on issues facing Arab citizens of Israel, whose work I warmly commend, and the Jerusalem-based Jewish Centre for Jewish-Christian Understanding.

In many ways, this debate merely surfaces an ongoing debate in many Jewish circles, in Israel and here. That debate concerns a widening gap in Israeli society between law and practice. In law, Israeli Arabs enjoy full equality and are endowed with the full spectrum of democratic rights. It is also the case that Israeli Arab citizens have made considerable social and economic progress in recent years. Mortality rates have fallen by nearly two-thirds over the past few decades, while life expectancy has risen and infant mortality rates have been slashed.

However, in practice there are many areas of life where Israeli Arabs are systematically disadvantaged. While Israel’s declaration of independence and basic laws purport to enshrine certain rights for Israel’s non-Jewish citizens, there is no explicit constitutional right to equality. Israel is yet to reconcile the tension between its identity as a Jewish state and its claim to be a democracy with equal rights for all. This means that non-Jews are effectively, in many respects, second-class citizens, denied the full rights which their Jewish co-citizens enjoy. As the Association of Civil Rights in Israel has pointed out,

“this is reflected in discriminatory policies in the areas of citizenship rights, economic and social welfare, employment, education and (most crucially) land ownership and development”.

So, Jewish and Arab Israelis have different citizenship rights and constraints in relation to marriage and family reunification. Their economic and social circumstances differ. Despite a legal ban on employment discrimination on the basis of ethnicity or religion, Arab citizens face significant disadvantages in the labour force. The most recent official Israeli survey to look at income differentials between individual employees suggested that the gross monthly income among Arab citizens of Israel was 32% lower than the comparative figure among Jewish citizens. There is, according to Israel’s own National Insurance Institute, a 53.5% incidence of poverty among non-Jewish families compared with 15.2% among Jewish families. Also, Arab communities are among the poorest in Israel. Almost nine in 10 of the localities in the lowest three socio-economic groups are Arab. Arab Bedouin are particularly disadvantaged, with up to 90,000 Bedouin deprived of their ancestral lands and living in what the Israeli Government call “illegally constructed villages” in the Negev where there are virtually no public utilities or government services.

According to the Legal Centre for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, Adalah, the starkest area of inequality and discrimination relates to land holding and planning. It states:

“Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel have unequal access to land resources, land rights, and the ability to use the resource of land to develop their communities”.

A UN report in 2003 suggested that Arab citizens, despite their 20%-plus population share, privately own just 3.5% of the state’s total land, while Arab municipalities had jurisdiction over only 2.5% of the total area of the state. In Galilee, despite a 72% share of the population, just 16% of the land is owned by Arab municipalities. Since 1961, there have been 291 new Jewish localities compared with, at most, 25 new non-Jewish ones. It is estimated that Arab citizens of Israel are, in practice, blocked from purchasing or leasing land on around 80% of the land in Israel on the basis of their ethnic identity. The way in which the 2011 admissions law is being used adds to the issue of discrimination a concern about further segregation.

Yet it did not have to be like this, and some of the early aspirations of the founders of the State of Israel were clearly very different. Indeed, the principles of equality and non-discrimination were enshrined in Israel’s declaration of independence of 4 May 1948, when the new state undertook to,

“uphold absolute social and political equality of rights for all citizens, without distinction of religion, race or sex”.

Twenty years ago, there were some grounds for optimism. It is important to remember the constructive work that Yitzhak Rabin did in his second term as Prime Minister to address these issues of inequality in Israel’s life. However, he was probably the last Israeli Prime Minister to do so.

In recent years, the Knesset has passed a raft of discriminatory legislation. In 2009, Avigdo Lieberman’s Yisrael Beitenu party became the second largest coalition partner, after an election campaign during which he repeatedly attacked Israel’s Arab minority. Since then, each Knesset session has been replete with overtly racist Bills that have helped further to alienate Israel’s non-Jewish citizens. Together they seem to be forming a pattern whereby extreme back-bench proposals become watered down to form a steady drip of government initiatives that are slowly eroding minority rights.

This seems to be backed by changes in Jewish Israeli public opinion, with both the FCO and the US Department of State noting a growing and disturbing climate of intolerance, with an increasing desire among a majority of the Jewish public to see preference for Jews over Arabs in various areas of public life and a willingness to see the two communities reducing contact and moving further apart.

Some have suggested that this debate should not be taking place as it colludes with hostility towards Israel rather than offering it a hand of friendship. Nothing could be further from the truth. A peaceful and prosperous Middle East needs a strong and secure Israel. However, threats to Israel’s security come not only from without but also from within. Increased discrimination so easily leads to radicalisation of those discriminated against, whether intentionally or unintentionally. Frustration fermenting beneath the surface could yet bubble over into societal conflict. Should current trends continue unabated, localised intercommunal violence should come as no surprise.

There is the further concern, raised by the Archbishop of Canterbury in a debate in your Lordships’ House a year ago, that discrimination and inequality contribute to the emigration of indigenous Christians from Israel, a further cause of polarisation and loss of community cohesion. By contrast, addressing the discrimination and inequality experienced by Israel’s Arab citizens, and so building community cohesion, could have positive implications both for the State of Israel and for the wider peace process. It would strengthen Israel’s democratic credentials by inviting more participatory models of citizenship, so enhancing a sense of community and belonging. Rehumanising the “other” within Israel might encourage a reframing of the way that Israel negotiates with its Arab neighbours.

The anniversary of the Or report next year offers an important occasion to take stock of the steps and measures that have been taken by the Israeli Government to address the levels of discrimination and inequality faced by Israel’s Arab citizens. Looking back nine years on, there is a widespread feeling that the institutional changes put forward by the Or Commission have not been whole-heartedly adopted. When I tabled a Written Question on the Or report a few months back, the noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford, responded on 24 September that,

“few of Or’s recommendations on the socio-economic causes of Israeli Arab frustration have been addressed. We continue to urge the Israeli Government to implement the recommendations made by the 2003 Or Commission, specifically to address (i) economic disparities; and (ii) unequal access to land and housing. In general we condemn all instances of inequality and discrimination against individuals and groups because of their faith, ethnicity or nationality”.—[Official Report, 24/9/12; col. WA 265.]

At the heart of this Motion is an understanding of human dignity and well-being. I am sure that all would agree that inequality and discrimination impair human dignity and flourishing. So I note with pleasure the strong interest shown by Her Majesty’s ambassador to Israel in supporting Israel’s minorities. Speaking at the Israeli Equal Opportunities Commission’s 2011 conference, Ambassador Matthew Gould said:

“Israel enjoys the most extraordinary diversity in its population”,

and that the,

“diversity of Israel’s population is something that should be celebrated”.

However, if that diversity is allowed to lead to increasing division, then the fabric of Israel’s society could be fatally damaged. For that to be avoided, the UK and the EU need to continue to press Israeli Governments for the realisation of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, in which Jews and Arabs live together with full and equal human dignity and civil rights.

Ultimately this is a question about the character of the Israeli state, the answer to which must have buy-in from all the communities of which it is composed.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

My Lords, we have had a good debate. I am grateful to all noble Lords who have taken part and to the Minister for her response. Every contribution raised a point to which I would be tempted to respond but I will resist that temptation. Just to return to the point made right at the beginning by the noble Lord, Lord Steel, on the important difference between the Israeli state and the Israeli Government, I regard myself as a loyal Briton but your Lordships may have noticed that I am not always the most enthusiastic flag-waver for everything that comes from the Front Bench to my right. To those noble Lords who talked about the importance of being friends to Israel, I am often reminded of that advertisement for malt whisky: “True friends give it to you straight”.

This is not just a matter of government. It is also a matter of culture—and the disturbing development of culture. We have in Israel today a vicious circle in which discrimination in law and practice leads to disengagement on the part of minorities, which then leads to fears of disloyalty on the part of the majority—and so the vicious circle goes round and round. We need to reverse that and achieve a virtuous circle, which will then flow out to touch the wider region. Otherwise, as the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, and the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, pointed out, we will see more people on the move yet again. We are not powerless. Many noble Lords have pointed to the leverage that we have through the robust and consistent application of international law.

Again, it is not just a question of law. A number of noble Lords pointed to the importance of grace. By one of those acts of serendipity, when I was having my breakfast this morning I turned on Radio 4 and heard “Thought for the Day”, given by the noble Lord, Lord Sacks. It was a remarkable reflection. He talked about yesterday’s results of the census and the rise in the number of those who say that they have no religion. He talked about the importance of religions facing the fact that they might be a minority. He said that was important because religion at its best speaks not out of power but out of powerlessness. Perhaps the healthiest society is one where all religions are a minority and so have to engage with one another. Those are wise words. They are a challenge to us here in the UK. They are also a challenge to Israel.

Motion agreed.