Silent Rap

Israeli Arabs threaten to punish Barak by staying away from the polls.

Elderly Druze residents of the northeastern Israeli Druze village Of Yirka applaud opposition Likud party leader
Ariel Sharon, whose picture is seen in the background, during an election campaign speech on Jan. 21.

JARED FISHMAN

Causes For Anger

Special to the Jewish News

Most Arabs consider Sharon — the one-time defense
minister blamed for allowing the massacres of some
800 Palestinian civilians at Sabra and Shatila camps
during the 1982 Lebanon War — a war criminal
and terrorist. So, why would they stay at home on
Election Day and guarantee his victory?
Two basic reasons: Anger over what Israeli Arabs
feel has been "institutionalized" inequality suffered
by the Arab sector within the Israeli political system,
and rage over the 13 Arab citizens of Israel who were
killed by Israeli police during the "al-Aqsa intifada"
riots in October.
"They are both murderers," says Harem Iraqi, a
middle-aged, working class father of four who has
consistently voted with the Labor Party. "Sharon
killed Arabs. Barak killed Arabs. At least with Sharon
you know what you are e. , i!Ig to get. Barak pretends
to be your friend, and then he kills you."
Things were "really bad" under former Likud
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, adds Nardin
Asleh, a medical student from the Israeli Arab village
of Arrabe. "But he didn't kill any Arab citizens."
She says a Sharon victory would not make matters
worse. Her brother Asel Asleh was killed by Israeli
police while reportedly standing in the midst of Arab
rioters during the violent demonstrations in
October. "I lost my brother," she says. "It cannot get
any worse than that."

Taibe, Israel
n the1999 Israeli elections, 98 percent of the
voters' of the Arab town of Taibe in the
Galilee voted for Ehud Barak for prime minis-
ter. But today in Taibe, the only new "pro-
Barak" billboard is an anti-Sharon advertisement.
In Arab sections of the mixed Jewish-Arab city of
Jaffa near Tel Aviv, the Barak posters from two years
ago are either peeling or have been defaced. And in
Tira, the left-leaning Arab village just south of Taibe,
the city walls, normally covered with political
posters, are bare. It is hard to believe an election for
prime minister is only a few days away.
In northern cafEs, however, the conversation cen-
ters on the elections. The central question is how
will Israeli Arabs vote on Tuesday, Feb. 6?
The answer: They may just elect to stay home.
Many Israeli Arabs are thinking of boycotting the
'elections — withholding their ballots for Barak.
According to observers, this will translate into almost
certain victory for Likud Party leader Ariel Sharon,
already far ahead in national surveys. Barak cannot
win, they say, without the critical mass of the Arab
voting block, which represents around 1 million
people — one of every five Israelis — and was key to
his 1999 victory.

I

2/2
2001

26

Discontent Grows

While Jewish Israeli society was taken aback at the
eruption of violence in Israeli Arab towns in the first
days of the intifada, the Arab community was equal-
ly shocked at the forceful reaction of Israeli police.
Though some of the protests were indeed very vio-
lent — with rocks and Molotov cocktails thrown
and roads blocked by burning tires — Arab Israelis
were stunned that their protestors were shot at.
"When Jews in B'nei B'rak protested with stones,
they were arrested," says Abu Mahmoud, an Israeli
Arab. "When we protest with stones, the police
killed us."
Israeli Arab discontent with Israeli governments
has grown steadily over the past two decades. Arabs
have protested against what they call a system that
discriminates against them through disproportionate
funding of schools and infrastructure, land expropri-
ation, and exclusion from mainstream political
involvement. No modern government has had an
Israeli Arab minister, though they hold 11 seats in
the Knesset.
The Oslo peace process brought with it an
increased identification with Palestinian nationalism,
and popular protest has steadily radicalized. Violent
demonstrations during the al-Naqba riots in May
were an early indicator of more radicalized protest.
The protests brought a Barak pledge of an added
$250 million a ,, ear in services to Arab communities.
In the northern Galilee, Ahab, an Israel Arab
teacher and peace activist, explains the violent nature
of the October protests. "I'm against the way the
Arabs protested," he says, "but we can't find the right
way, because no one listens to us.
Omar, a shop owner adds, "Israel is supposed to
be democratic but it acts democratically only for the
Jewish citizens."

"

Arranging To Boycott

Now, many Israeli Arabs are vowing to express their
discontent within the democratic system by exploit-
ing their power to vote — or rather, not to vote.
The Arab leadership is threatening to use the same
approach that cost Shimon Peres the election in
1996: boycott. At that time, Israeli Arabs could not
bring themselves to vote for a man who, though
considered "pro-peace," gave the orders to bomb
their "cousins" in Lebanon for three weeks, in retali-
ation for repeated Hezbollah attacks on Israeli tar-
gets.
Leaders behi"d the boycott initiative have planned
meetings, demonstrations and a newspaper publicity
campaign to dissuade Arabs from participating in
elections. Bumper stickers read: "We will not forget.
We will not forgive."
Israeli Arab public figures have urged voters to stay
at home on Election Day, proclaiming it as the
"rational choice." The Committee to Boycott the
Elections, a group of left-wing public figures, and
representatives of families who lost children in the
October violence, have billed this election as an
opportunity for Palestinian citizens of Israel to have
their voices heard within the democratic process.
"Boycotting the elections ... is a national obliga-
tion of the utmost importance for the purpose of
changing the current political formula, expressed in