There is no Arab left-wing in Israel

You call this a left?

The left is supposed to bridge the gap and the national tension by positing a civic agenda that crosses ethnic boundaries. The question is whether there is such a leftist agenda among the Arabs in Israel.

Salman Masalha

There is no
Arab left-wing
in Israel

There's no left without Arabs, states Oudeh Basharat (Haaretz, July 19 ), adding: "Had the 11 MKs of the Hadash faction and the Arab factions evaporated during the vote on the Boycott Law, the difference in favor of supporters of the law would have increased from nine to 20 votes."

It's true, there's no left without Arabs; but this slogan is only a half truth. The left is supposed to bridge the gap and the national tension by positing a civic agenda that crosses ethnic boundaries. The question is whether there is such a leftist agenda among the Arabs in Israel. Because in order for there to be a genuine left in Israel, there also has to be some kind of Arab left. And it seems that such a left does not exist.

Basharat did well to try to distinguish between his party, Hadash, and the other Arab factions - because Hadash is, in essence, a Jewish-Arab party, centered around the Israeli Communist Party (Maki ). However, Basharat cannot deny that Hadash has long since lost its unique character on the Israeli political landscape, and its leaders, especially on its Arab side, are not preoccupied with an ideological, social and political discussion, but rather with slogans and a chauvinistic, populist competition with the other groups in the Arab sector.

Blatant evidence of this can be found in the words of Mohammed Nafa, the secretary general of Maki, which were published in Arabic on the Hadash Web site. You have to read his words in order to understand the deterioration of the party that in the past presumed to be Jewish-Arabic, with a progressive civic and social agenda. The secretary-general of the party unashamedly comes to the defense of the murderous and tyrannical Syrian regime: "We will never surrender to the Israeli prostitution that is trying to portray Israel as a victim," he writes to his readers in Arabic, adding: "We must be more involved in the struggle against the Israeli and American occupation rather than in attacking the Syrian regime. The Syrian, North Korean and Iranian dictatorships are far preferable to the American, Israeli and NATO occupiers and all their Arab collaborators, especially in the Gulf states."

So the party that is supposed to fly the flag of the left aligns itself with the benighted ayatollahs of Iran, with the North Korean dictatorship - one of the darkest regimes on earth - and with the murderous tribal regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad that for months has been massacring Syrian citizens and cutting the throats of those who desire and are pursuing freedom.

Can the "pearls of wisdom" of the secretary-general of the Israeli Communist Party be a part of any leftist agenda? I doubt it. It seems that aside from the blind hatred for the United States and Israel that in the past decades has become a kind of populist Arab religion, he has nothing to offer, certainly not an agenda that a genuine left is supposed to present to Jews and Arabs in Israel.

Basharat comes to the correct conclusion in his article: "Only an alliance between the Arabs and the sane forces among the Jews can stop the slide into fascism. The rank and file Arab citizen must be given the sense that he has a good reason to go out and vote - that he has allies."

It's true, an alliance of the sane, Arabs and Jews, could serve as a dam to block the fascism that is suddenly sweeping the country. But it would seem that the words of the secretary-general of Maki, which we have cited here, not only fail to attest to sanity, but leave no reason for a rank and file Arab or Jewish citizen to vote for a party whose spiritual leader is a person who espouses such views.
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Published: Op-Ed, Haaretz, 26 July 2011

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Politicians as mercenaries

Arab MKs must beg forgiveness for Libya visit
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Salman Masalha

Politicians as mercenaries

The whole world is watching the misdeeds of the Libyan tyrant. Muammar Gadhafi spares no instrument of repression: He dispatches planes to sow death indiscriminately and sends African mercenaries to slaughter his own people. Gadhafi knows, deep within, just how small he seems in the eyes of the world, but cannot shed his role as megalomaniacal tribal despot.

The entire world saw him stand before the camera, in his robe and turban, with his Green Book. He lectured loudly, as befits the leader of Libya - the country he sees as "leader of the world." He spoke approvingly of the modes of response used by other world powers on the level of Libya, such as Russia, the United States, China and Israel.

I will not dwell on the hypocrisy of the West with regard to the events in Libya, which are obvious to even the naked eye.

I shall instead speak of Arab hypocrisy here, closer to home. The hypocrisy of the Arab Knesset members and public figures who a few months ago went to grovel before the Libyan despot.

They returned to Israel to boast and publish, in Arabic, their stories and pictures from the thrilling meeting with the "king of kings" and other such hyperbole a la MK Ahmed Tibi (United Arab List-Ta'al ).

All the Arab parties, organizations and ethnic-religious communities were represented in the delegation there. MK Mohammad Barakeh of Hadash, Hanin Zuabi and Jamal Zahalka of Balad, Talab al-Sana of United Arab List-Ta'al and a motley crew of people of lofty status and groveling spirit. They all came before him, bowed and shook his hand. He inspected them from behind dark glasses before seating them at the edge of his tent and lecturing them on demographics.

Former MK Azmi Bishara, who after fleeing Israel became a commentator on the television station of another little tyrant, also sought shelter in Gadhafi's tent. But because he too is a small megalomaniac he would not agree to join a delegation of Israeli Arabs.

He wanted a separate audience, he longed to talk to Gadhafi as one megalomaniac to another. Bishara is no different than most hypocritical Arab intellectuals, merely the loyal servant of despots as long as their regime is strong.

Then all of a sudden, when Gadhafi's regime was began to fail, Bishara remembered the Libyan people. Typically, he never said a word about the injustices of Syria's despotic regime, which for decades has been repressing freedom-loving citizens. Here's what Syrians think of Bishara's hypocrisy: "Doesn't the Syrian people deserve the freedom and rights that he enjoyed in Palestine, thanks to his Zionist enemies?" questioned Subhi Hadidi, a Syrian intellectual living in exile in Paris.

The truth is that Arab intellectuals of Bishara's ilk are like carrion-eaters. Like a pack of hyenas they wait on the sidelines, seeing which way the wind in the Arab political jungle is blowing; they watch the fall of a tyrant and then swoop in to grab a portion of "glory" from the body's remains.

All the Arab public figures who went to Libya were as political mercenaries in the service of Gadhafi the tyrant. They should now publicly express remorse and beg forgiveness, first from the Libyan people and next from the Arab citizens they purport to represent.

A public accounting is not only necessary but would also show that they have learned their lesson and intend to mend their ways. If not, Israel's Arab citizens should turn their backs on them and toss them in the garbage, just as Arab nations are rising up against their corrupt leaders. And the sooner, the better.
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Published: OP-Ed, Haaretz, February 27, 2011

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Read also: Libyan Junk(et), April 2010

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The media fanned the flames

Salman Masalha

The media fanned the flames

It wasn't only pinecones that burst, flew far from the trees and ignited more fires in the forests. The media also set up studios and sent out reporters who stoked another fire, on top of those that engulfed the Carmel.

Faced with the tragedy of the bus that went up in flames with its occupants, the evacuation of residents from their homes and the appeals for aid from other nations, their mission this time was to transmit, in live broadcasts, "information" received from anonymous sources about the existence of some kind of "conspiracy." The reporters were quick to report outbreaks of fire in various places and point to an alleged "guiding hand" behind the fires.

But the "guiding hand" was not a hand, but rather an anonymous arm of the government, which leaked this "information" to reporters on the scene in a desperate attempt to obscure the authorities' inability to deal with the fire and distract attention from their own negligence and failures by collectively accusing the residents of Isfiya and Daliat al-Carmel, and through them the entire Arab community, of responsibility for the fires. Facing off against these anonymous sources were "knowledgeable sources" in ultra-Orthodox circles who pulled out the default mantra of Sabbath desecration, which for the ignorant explains everything.

Against the background of general panic over the fire department's helplessness, broadcasters reported willingly for a kind of media reserve duty. Every reporter who had a chance to face the camera was quick to report, whether maliciously or innocently, the alleged information he was getting by text message from those anonymous sources.

The media, in all its forms and outlets, must do some thorough soul-searching. The irresponsible behavior we witnessed, in the form of transmitting "information" without bothering to check its veracity, is the type of ember that will continue to glow under the surface long after the flames die down. Such embers whip up the flame of hatred between Jews and Arabs, and they will ignite an even greater fire when the opportunity arises. And there is no lack of opportunities for an eruption in this security-conscious land.

On the other hand, the fire can serve as an opportunity for leaders of the Arab community to do some soul-searching and demonstrate wise civic leadership on behalf of the people they are supposed to represent and all the country's residents. The heads of Arab local councils often complain, justifiably, about the central government's failure to deal with the Arab sector's problems: the rising crime in Arab communities, the relatively high number of Arab drivers involved in car accidents and other ills that must be thoroughly addressed. Here is a chance to encourage young Arab men and women to volunteer for national service in the fire department. Because, as we just saw, evil flames of all kinds can devour everything good.

Volunteering for the fire brigades will send various civic messages: We're all in the same boat in the battle to preserve nature. We're all in the same boat in the battle to save life and stop the killing on our roads. Both nature and the roads belong to all of us, and it is our duty to safeguard them not only for ourselves, but for future generations.

National service in the fire department also has an educational aspect that is no less important: contributing to the general good regardless of petty, populist politics. Such national service could also open many fields of interest and study to young men and women later in life.

If everyone joins together to do some soul-searching, maybe there will be a silver lining in the cloud of smoke.
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Published: Op-Ed, Haaretz, December 7, 2010
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Arabs, speak Hebrew!

Salman Masalha

Arabs, speak Hebrew!

Many Arab eyebrows - those of politicians and populist education officials - will no doubt be raised when they read this headline. At the same time, we should discuss the issue of language with due seriousness and detached from the sensitivity connected to it.

The Education Ministry recently published data on achievement levels in the school system. One finding particularly caught my eye - on achievements of students examined in Hebrew, especially Arab pupils. The report spoke of the catastrophic situation in the Arab community and said Arab students had the lowest average grade in Hebrew language. The grade in Arabic for Arab Students was only slightly higher.

Recent research by Prof. Zohar Eviatar and Dr. Rafiq Ibrahim of the University of Haifa's psychology department explain the problem from another angle. The researchers compared the speed and accuracy of comprehending texts among Arabic speakers, Hebrew speakers and English speakers. They found that the right hemisphere of the brain is involved in learning to read in Hebrew and English but not at all in learning to read Arabic.

This stems from the graphic complexity of Arabic writing, they believe. Arabic letters are joined together and change shape according to their location in a word. In addition, many letters are distinguished from one another by minute graphic signs alone. Thus Arabic writing's graphic uniqueness becomes a heavy burden on children when they are learning to read.

The data explain the considerable gap between students at Arabic-language schools and those at schools where the language of instruction is Hebrew or English. The data also partially explain Israel's low standing compared with the developed countries in international tests of schoolchildren. This gap, linked to the language's sad situation, exists in the entire Arab world. It's not by chance that not one Arab university is among the world's best 500 universities. This finding has nothing to do with Zionism or Israel.

Everyone knows that the Arabic taught in schools is compared with Hebrew or any other foreign language, but it is not the language Arab children speak at home. The mother tongue they speak at home is totally different from the literary Arabic taught at school. This situation exists throughout the Arab world.

The Arab public in Israel is not isolated from the general Arabic linguistic arena. The Arabic-language media, especially radio and television, do not provide the linguistic richness of formal Arabic. The opposite is true: They perpetuate linguistic superficiality that leads to intellectual superficiality.

Despite all this, an educational revolution is possible here. The positive results of such a revolution would be felt in just a few years. To this end, we need the courage to put the ultimate educational demand on the table: The Arabic and Druze departments at the Education Ministry must be abolished immediately and all the syllabi must be united into one core syllabus for everyone. Some 80 percent of the syllabus should include the teaching materials required for a modern and advanced education. For the remainder, special emphasis on the cultural interests of a segment of the population should be permitted.

We can conduct yet another revolutionary experiment - choose from the Arab community one or more class and decide that the language of instruction there, from kindergarten through high school, will be Hebrew. If we carry out an experiment like this, I'm convinced the positive results will not be long in coming.
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Published: Opinion-Haaretz, September 27, 2020

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Libyan Junk(et)

Salman Masalha

Libyan Junk(et)

This week's visit to Libya by an Israeli Arab delegation signifies a loss of both political and moral orientation. The group, which included representatives of all Arab political parties, sectors and communities, exposed the depth of political confusion among those who pretend to represent Israel's Arab citizens. The visit did nothing to gain respect for either the delegation members or their constituency.

These members despise each other no less than they despise Avigdor Lieberman and his ilk in the Zionist parties, in some cases even more so. But wonder of wonders, all of a sudden they all came together to fly off and enjoy the hospitality of none other than Muammar Gadhafi, the man who more than anyone else represents the ugly side of the Arab regimes, the tribal autocracy. This capricious and unpredictable individual can unblinkingly say one thing and the opposite in the same breath, and no one will dare to ask him to explain, out of fear that the question will be the last he ever asks.

After a meal offered by their host came the groveling speeches, which included all the tired old slogans and the superlatives that despots of the lowest kind expect to hear about themselves. Outdoing everyone was MK Talab al-Sana, who asked the tyrant whether Libya would open its universities to Arab students from Israel. And his wish was immediately granted.

Instead of concern for schools and education here, al-Sana wants to send students to Libya. But this orotund and energetic legislator did not say where he is contemplating sending these students, or what he expects them to learn there. Perhaps to the Libyan Institute for Nano-Embroidery, or the Libyan Academy of Barbecuing Science?

After the flattery, the great leader, His Majesty the King of Kings and Emperor of Emperors, reportedly sat his guests down and gave them two solid hours of his infantile theories. He urged them, inter alia, to take two, three or four wives each, and to have lots of children. Not one of them had a word to say in reply.

It must be said loud and clear: Not only are such trips by Arab representatives to kowtow before Arab despots an insult to the intelligence, they also harm the just struggle of this country's Arab minority. Just by going to such places and saying what they say there, they are deepening mainstream Israeli society's rejection of the Arabs - the rejection against which they have been fighting a just fight for years. By not resisting the temptation to accept the invitations of Arab dictators, whoever they happen to be, they become tools of those dictators.

Astonishingly, those taking part in the junket included members of political parties like Balad, which brandishes the banner of "A state of all its citizens," and Hadash, which day in and day out emphasizes that it is a Jewish-Arab party. All of a sudden, all these MKs forgot that they have sworn an oath of loyalty to the State of Israel in the Knesset, and whom and what they are supposed to represent. They forgot that "all its citizens" means Jewish citizens, too. They forgot that a "Jewish-Arab" party includes Jews, too. They forgot all their fine and correct slogans and flew off to take shelter in the tent of the unknown.

Delegations like these reveal the civil, political and national immaturity of this country's Arab leadership. They point up the chronic emotional, social and political abandonment suffered by Arab citizens and their leaders.

This trip to Libya has exposed the wretchedness of the people who claim to represent and lead Israeli Arab society. Arab citizens deserve a better type of leadership - one that is serious and mature.

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Published in: Op-Ed, Haaretz, April 29, 2010
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Salman Masalha

The Arab Holy of Holies

Last Saturday (February 7, 2010) a demonstration against violence towards women in Arab society was held in Nazareth, at the initiative of the Higher Arab Monitoring Committee. It isn’t every day that Arab women win reinforcements in the shape of marchers from the entire spectrum of Arab politics in Israel. The ink on the placards carried in the procession had barely dried when reports were published of yet another woman who was killed.

Some say “family honor killings” in Arab society is another variation of violence towards women. However, it is impossible to ignore the fact that while in other societies the murderers are husbands or lovers, who commit the murder in a context foolishly called “romantic,” in Arab society these crimes are committed by brothers, fathers and male cousins as well. Arab intellectuals, who evade responsibility by equating the two phenomena, fall into trap that locates them in a dark corner: Stipulating an equivalency between the two phenomena obliges them to explain what is “romantic” about the murder of a woman by her brother, her father or some other male relative.

To get tot the root of the problem it suffices to read an article Sheikh Kamal Khatib, deputy head of the Islamic Movement in Israel, wrote in January of 2007. The article reflects the prevailing norm in many levels of Arab society, in all the communities – Muslims, Druze and to a lesser extent Christian. Khatib harshly attacked the demand to defend women’s rights and compared it to colonialist conspiracies.

Khattib’s remarks came in response to an article written by attorney Samar Khamis of the Adalah Legal Center for Minority Rights in Israel. She spoke about the oppression of the Arab woman and gave as an example forced marriages and the sanctification of virginity. “The call to revoke the sanctity of virginity,” wrote Khattib, “is tantamount to slashing with a dagger and crudely attacking our religious, moral and national holy of holies.” What angered Khattib more that anything else was the existence of the Aswat (Voices) organization of Arab gay women: “What service do such women give apart from corrupting, destroying and abandoning our people’s morality, image and identity?” thundered Khattib in his article.

The perception that loads the entire burden of “Arab honor” onto women’s shoulders draws its strength from the tribal structure, which is the main obstacle to the society’s development. The roots of the problem lie, on the one hand, in the total lack of understanding of the essence of masculinity, and on the other hand in the fact that the Arab male lives in a state of cultural, religious, social and political oppression. The battered Arab man has grown up in an oppressive tribal structure in which he seeks out the weakest link in order to beat it, oppress it and even murder it. In this way he relieves his frustration by loading his “lost personal honor” onto the woman’s shoulders.

The deep meaning of this outlook is that none other than the Arab man himself denies himself his personal honor. Since he is also denied his social, cultural and political honor he finds, in a circuitous and also cowardly way, a substitute for demonstrating his masculine honor. This is in the extremely low way of demonstrating superiority towards the Arab woman.

In order to bring about a change there is a need for a revolution of consciousness, the aim of which is to liberate the Arab male from the oppression in which he is sunk. Education, both in the home and at school, must transmit the perception that honor stems from the individual himself. The individual’s personal honor is connected solely to the individual himself and no other individual has any connection to this honor. The distorted perception of male honor is what is destroying Arab society and these issues necessitate profound and courageous discussion.

It has been my good fortune to number among my best friends some Arab lesbians. I can say that the contribution these women make to society is far greater that that of many Arab men, whose entire maleness boils down to puffing their chests and growing mustaches.

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Published in Hebrew: Special to Haaretz Online, February 11, 2010,

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Anthem for the Tribe of Israel

Salman Masalha

ANTHEM FOR THE TRIBE OF ISRAEL

Yitzhak Rabin was murdered on the tense border between the Jewish and the Israeli. He was murdered by the emissaries of the Jewish tribe because he had the courage to try to expand the grazing lands of the Israeli tribe at the expense of the Jewish tribe. Thus the Golem took revenge on its creator.

It is not by chance that in the national anthem there is no hint of “Israeli-ness.” On the contrary, the emphasis in “Hatikva” (The Hope) is on the deepest religious facet connected to time (history) and place (the Land of Zion): “The Jewish soul yearning ... the eye gazing towards Zion ... the Land of Zion, Jerusalem." The combination of the two, the soul and the place, cannot but be mytho-religious. The Israeli national anthem is a Jewish religious prayer – and not Israeli. Therefore Israel is a religious Jewish legal entity and not a secular state. And when the leaders of the state were not wise enough, or were unable to, or perhaps did not want to break this link between religion and state, they sinned the primal sin of Zionism. Two decades later came the June, 1967 war and brought the Jewish tribe into physical contact with the places that are so laden with mythological times and values. The noose grew tighter.

To the primal sin was added another sin. In every nuance, it has never succeeded in adopting a value discourse that has self-confidence facing the religious discourse. On the contrary, Israeli secularism has been taken over by feelings of inferiority facing fundamentalist religious discourse. For this reason Israeli secularism has not attributed importance to written words and to words spoken in the public arena. The right, of all hues, religious and non-religious, has known how to exploit to the fullest the words that are laden with sanctity. And this is the great breaking-point.

Thus, again and again mythological figures have cropped up from the past – Amalek, Pharoah, Haman and even figures from the recent past like Hitler. The right, which is nurtured on religious texts and claims family and tribal values, has eyes in the back of its head like someone in the clutches of constant paranoia. It also sees the future with magic spectacles that is always showing it pictures from the monstrous past. The right tries to infect everyone with this paranoia. And it does not grow up in a vacuum. Its source is in part in the fact that deep down the right is aware that it has done a terrible injustice to the other, and the other in this case is the Palestinian.

The right, in its very essence, is imprisoned in this trap. Part of the left, not all of it, is trying to get out of it with as few casualties as possible.

Yitzhak Rabin did understand the grave danger that lies in this trap. He was aware that he has Chief of General Staff had got Israel into it. When he saw how things were, he had the courage to begin to seek ways to get out. But, being a general, he wanted the retreat to take place with the minimum of casualties. This is also the reason for his hesitancy and suspicion.

To get out of the trap Rabin was prepared to take great steps forward. He was prepared to tip the balance in favor Israeli tribalism rather than Jewish tribalism. The right’s reaction was to come to him with the racist demand for “a Jewish majority.” This demand even managed to seep into his own party. In a desperate attempt he tired to unravel the tangle and began to talk in different language. terms like racism and apartheid, of which he accused the right, came out of his mouth in despairing tones, and this is how they were described by the government broadcasting channel just a few days before the assassination.

The mourning that swept through the Arabs of Israel after the assassination was genuine and true, it sprang from the deepest source, from that border that divides biological parents from adoptive parents. This is the mourning of a child who was abandoned in 1948 by his biological parents, and after Oslo understood finally where he stood and in what family he had grown up. He had even begun to love the adoptive family and was not afraid of expressing his feelings in public. Rabin gave this child a spark of hope of adoption by the new state of Israel and of becoming an integral part of the Israeli family. However, this was also the reason for the assassination. Therefore, the public debate following the murder tried to avoid the mourning and fate of this child, who constitutes 20 percent of the citizens of Israel (50 percent of those who participated in the rally on the night of the murder, according to the assassin).

This poison potion of tribalism and religion is the place where the ideology grows that sprouts not weeds but base murderers, even if the victim is a Jewish prime minister. The shock and astonishment expressed by many people at the fact that “a Jew had done this” is indicative of hypocrisy and stupidity. This is the battle between human law and the law of the tribe and God, who know only vengeance. Yhis is also, in part, the reason for the rejoicing that was heard among small parts of the Jewish public here and abroad. I venture to predict that the next struggle will not be over the question of who is a Jew. It will be a struggle over the question of who is an Israeli. And participating in this struggle will be all the citizens of Israel, Jews and Arabs.

Jerusalem, November 1995

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Translated by Vivian Eden
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From the Memorial Book for Yitzhak Rabin:
Asher Ahavta et Yitzhak (Yitzhak, Whom You Love), ed. Zisi Stavi, Aliza Zeigler, Miskal - Publishing & Distribution, Tel-Aviv 1995
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