Arab Israelis status on 60th anniversary of Israel's establishment
Palestine-Israel, Politics, 5/13/2008

Israel celebrated its 60th anniversary of its establishment on May 8th under such conditions that a 5th of its population still enjoy least level of civil rights, have lowest possible political participation and live at lowest social status.

The Arab Israelis on the verge of the celebrations of the 60th anniversary of the establishment of Israel are still not benefitting from an annual budget to meet their least natural demands, even after 60 years of the Israeli government's existance.

According to Muhammad Barakah, the leader of Hadash Party and that party's representative at the Parliament, in Israel's 2008 Budget Bill, that is the most unprecedented budget in the history of that regime, the Arab Israeli's share is merely a bit over 4% ( according to Yideot Aharonet, Dec. 18, 2007). That is while the Arab Israelis comprise 20% of Israel's population.

Sixty years of forced coexistence between the Arabs, mostly Palestinians, and the Jews in occupied territories in 1948 has led to transferring the anti-Arab tendencies of the Israeli government to the society as well, since the level of discrimination observed against Israel's Arab citizens finds wider dimensions with the passage of each new day.

Israel's Civil Rights Association that was established in the year 2007 on the verge of the International Human Rights Week in a recent report announced that some 50% of the population of Israel are opposed to the idea that the Arab and Jewish Israelis should enjoy equal civil rights, while 78% of them are opposed to the idea that Arab political parties should have representatives at government bodies (Haaretz, Dec. 9, 2007).

Furthermore, talks on giving away Israel's Arab residing regions to the self-rule Palestinian Authority (PA) in return for keeping the Jewish townships within the West Bank during the course of the past few months in Israeli media, press, and political circles, which was initially denied as rumors, was finally vastly confirmed as true by Deputy Israeli Prime Minister Haim Ramon (Arwatz Shwa, Dec. 17, 2007).

The fact that such an idea has hit the minds of Israeli leaders reveals that the Israeli regime fears the Jewish identity would be weakened in the future, and thus, efforts aimed at ratifying a new constitution in which a solid Jewish country would need to be mentioned would be put at stake has aroused no certain objection on the part of the western human rights groups thus far though. All the same, the contents of this law, and the definitions included in it can very well reveal the real nature of the Israeli regime and its western supporters.

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