The recent announcement that Palestinian communities in Israel will be provided with a bus service for the first time since Israel’s founding – that is, in 62 years – surprised observers who had not realised second-class citizenship also extends to being deprived of a bus line.
People often object to the comparison of Israel within the Green Line to apartheid South Africa. After all, there are no segregated park benches or buses (apart from those kosher lines that the Haredi vigilantes patrol). True enough, but who needs to segregate buses on an ethnic basis if they are simply not provided to Palestinian communities in the first place?
A couple of interesting elements to this story, however, have been missed in the telling.
The first is that – assuming the new bus service actually starts, as promised – it will be restricted to a very small number of Palestinian towns and larger villages. How regular it will be is still far from clear. Compare the minimal service Palestinian citizens can belatedly expect with the service offered to Jews throughout not only Israel but also the occupied territories.
In fact, an Egged bus line is one of the first services provided to small Jewish settlement outposts when they are established in remote West Bank locations. Buses arrive frequently, even though they serve a tiny number of families living there. The outposts, of course, are illegal – not only under international (as are all the settlements) but also in Israeli law. So Egged, the national bus company, and the transport ministry conspire with the settlers in flagrant law-breaking to make the outposts viable places to live.
By contrast, transport officials have grudgingly agreed to provide a very limited service to a few Palestinian communities six decades after Israel’s establishment.
Another point is that the new bus service to Palestinian communities inside Israel will not end Israel’s special type of veiled segregation. The bus lines will effectively serve Palestinians only, running between the main Palestinian towns and villages. From what is known so far, they will not be integrated into the larger “Jewish” bus network. This seriously erodes the significance of the service.
Palestinian communities suffer from very high levels of unemployment, particularly among women, where the rates are among the worst in the world. Israeli Jews tend to take comfort in blaming a “primitive” and chauvinist Arab society for chaining their women to the kitchen sink.
Actually, Palestinian women in Israel generally have a better level of education than the men, and many are keen to work. The chief obstacle is that Palestinian citizens are largely excluded from what is effectively a “Jewish economy”. Men can usually find employment as casual workers on building sites and in agriculture. But most women do now want to engage in hard manual labour, and in any case their communities lack the state-subsidised creche and nursery facilities common in Jewish communities.
The few lucky women who still manage to find an office job, however, need to reach places that provide such employment – which almost always means in a Jewish community. An integrated transport system would make that possible. For the past 62 years it has not existed and the new service looks like it will still do nothing to address this key problem.
A further reason a useful public transport system is so desperately needed in Palestinian communities is that, without it, Palestinians have to own a car to search for and keep their jobs. Why should that matter? Because owning a car automatically disqualifies a worker from receiving unemployment benefit if he or she loses their job or fails to find one. The law applies equally to all citizens but, given the lack of a proper bus service only in Palestinian communities, its effect is chiefly to harm Palestinian citizens.
A related, but little-known catch adds to the precariousness of welfare entitlements for Israel’s Palestinian workforce – and again clearly discriminates against them compared to Israeli Jews.
Unemployment benefit is also not available to those who own their own home. Again, the ruling applies to Jewish and Palestinian citizens alike, so why call it discriminatory? Well, that is the beauty of Israel’s apartheid – it looks so clean to the uninitiated.
In fact, as is well known, 93 per cent of the land in Israel has been nationalised – for the benefit of the Jewish people. Apart from a tiny number of wealthy Jewish private land owners, Israeli Jews hold only long-term leases on their land and homes from the state. They therefore qualify for unemployment benefit.
But Palestinian citziens live on private land – about 2.5 per cent of Israeli territory the state has not yet confiscated. Almost all Palestinian citizens own the land on which they have built their homes, often with their own labour. They are therefore denied unemployment benefit.
The lack of proper bus services is one thread woven into a rich tapestry of discriminatory laws and practices designed to marginalise, weaken and exclude Israel’s 1.3 million Palestinian citizens. Unpicking them is a vital task.
Jonathan Cook is a writer and journalist based in Nazareth, Israel. His website is www.jkcook.net.
Bezabt-bidiyuk-exactly. A perfectly fair and reasonable ethnocracy.
Recommendation circa 2007 -
PALESTINIAN UNITY AND SOLIDARITY
The issue of land ownership is a vital point in understanding the brutal treatment of Bedouin in the Negev. They are claiming ownership of the land where they live. This concept is anathema to the Jewish state. Only the Jewish state can own the Jewish land. Or, at the least, only Jews.
It is also an important point to consider for those projecting a binational state. Israel already claims much of the WB as “state land”. The settlement project is a way of systematically denying Palestinian ownership of Palestinian land. How does a binational state not threaten the remaining few parcels?
What a generous offer by Israelis to offer a bus service. Will they brag to the international press now. Look at what we are doing, guys. You see, occupation isn’t as bad as it seems.
Noam Chomsky used to talk about this southern American slave owner. He would say, our slaves are happy. We give them food and housing and they have children. Why would there be any need for them to have freedom?
Southern congressmen call it, putting lipstick on a pig.
What a generous offer by Israelis to offer a bus service. Will they brag to the international press now. Look at what we are doing, guys. You see, occupation isn’t as bad as it seems.
The proposed bus service (I’m not holding my breath) is for towns within Israel, not the OT, which is supposed to be “autonomous”.
In any case it is certainly boast-worthy. After all there may be some villages in Yemen or Egypt where Arabs are denied bus service, while the Jewish state promises that its Arab citizens will one day enjoy the best that modern transport has to offer.
Yeah. Kind of like how “uppity” African Americans were supposed to be grateful they were allowed on the bus at all, so they better sit in the back and do as they were told by their “betters.”
I thought all the Pal girls were shopping in the Mall these days. Beck showed a video clip of the Mall on his show, to show Americans the Pals got it good.
The young Palestinian women shopping were very clean and beautiful.
This Mall?
link to haaretz.com
I’m curious as to how the ‘mehadrin’ lines handle Arab riders (and Christian clergy bearing prominent crosses.)
If there is indeed discrimination against non-Jewish riders, it is a big – and not yet told – story for Israelis.
As far as I know, the ‘mehadrin” lines (public bus lines in which men and women are separated) are only concerned with “promiscuity”. I haven’t heard of any specific issues with Arab passengers. As for “Christian clergy bearing prominent crosses”, in all the years I lived in Jerusalem I can’t recall ever having seen a Christian clergyman on a West-Jerusalem bus.
What are the precise details of the current and proposed services?
Using Egged website, I can already find info on buses to Umm Al-Fahm, Tamra.
E.g. Nazareth-Tamra runs many times per day.
So major Arab-Israeli towns already have some service?
Israel may be the new South Africa, but Iraq will soon be the new Cambodia.
“Israel may be the new South Africa, ”
Good to see you do not deny it..
As for Iraq you’ll have to thank Dubya for the great job..
Who wants to place a bet?
The buses which will be used to serve these Palestinian villages in Israel will be from the British mandate period. The passengers would be lucky to have a window that opened. Forget about A/C and well-padded seats. Or, perhaps Israel plans on using decommissioned vans from the prison system.
Another ‘neutral’ criterium for discrimination is whether people have served in the IDF, since few Israeli Arabs have done army service. The Druze do army service, but the other muslims don’t . The trick then is to make rules that include a requirement of army service but make exceptions for Haredim. I’m trying to look up examples here, if anyone has a link it’s welcome.
I found that David Kretzmer has written about 3 levels of discrimination in laws:
- overt discrimination, such as the law of return and nationality, and delegation of government tasks to institutions that are only concerned with jewish affairs.
- covert discrimination: having served in the army makes a big difference for child allowance, public sector jobs, subsidies for higher education, housing loans, training program support(?).
- institutionalized discrimination in bureaucratic decision making: who gets money for infrastructure works, healthcare, schooling etc.
And Cook mentions Kretzmer here link to counterpunch.org
I had no idea. The joke that Israelis hold American values gets less and less funny.
Generally speaking, this way, land cannot be sold by a Jew to a non-Jew. So, Zionism ensures that non-Jews cannot get their hands on land unless approved by the top echelons, i.e. the State.