The lies they teach their children

I was sitting in a church in Jerusalem’s Old City with participants on a program I work with; young Jews from around the globe, living here for a year to learn about Israeli society and politics.

We wanted them to hear from different religious leaders, and here we were, meeting with a young, Palestinian Christian priest.

He called for an end to Israeli control of the Old City saying that under Arab control “all religions would be respected”.  One of my group remarked that Jews could be forgiven for being sceptical given that no Jew was allowed to set foot in the Old City during the years of Jordanian control between 1949-1967.  Our speaker’s response?  “I’ve never heard of this before.  I’m sure that’s not how it was.”

Enemies of the state

Hanin Zouabi is the first female Member of Knesset for an Arab party. Despite this milestone, interviews she has given indicate that Arab women’s issues will not be her main focus. A protégé of the former leader of her Balad Party, Azmi Bishara, it appears that she shares his agenda – to campaign for the dissolution of Israel as a Jewish state.

(Bishara is currently living in Jordan to escape his arrest by Israeli security services on charges of espionage and aiding enemies of the state, specifically Hizballah.)

Some 20 percent of the population of Israel is Arab, almost 1.5 million people. The vast majority of them are law-abiding and, though they frequently voice opposition to Israeli policies in the territories, the number of Israeli Arabs that have been involved in supporting or perpetrating acts of terrorism is tiny. Nevertheless, when prominent figures in the Arab community, like MKs, use their public platform as a pulpit from which to support antisemitic terror organisations and to call for Israel’s demise, it creates understandable fear of an Arab “fifth column” and strengthens extremists on the Jewish side.