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Naqab

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A Bedouin shepherd keeps a watchful eye on his herd ensuring they graze within the allotted land in Beit Hanoun, Gaza, February 18, 2022 (Photo: Mahmoud Nasser)

Moving without borders and traveling without restrictions is part of the nomads’ identity and way of life. During the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century, the semi-arid region of the an-Naqab was inhabited mostly by semi-nomadic Bedouin tribes, but this life was destroyed by Israeli colonialism. Still, a strong Bedouin identity lives on in Gaza and across the region.

Israel postponed its eviction of the Salhiya family in Sheikh Jarrah to make way for a Palestinian school after international outrage apparently caught the government by surprise. But it’s a familiar pattern. Israel gets away with whatever ethnic cleansing it can get away with, until the resistance, international critique, or condemnation become loud enough for it to delay and use other methods towards the same end.

A shuttered Palestinian shop in Hebron closed down by the Israeli military that was vandalized with a Star of David, an ancient Jewish symbol adopted by the Israeli state as a national symbol. (Photo: Lauren Surface)

Adalah’s General Director, Attorney Hassan Jabareen offers a probing analysis of the “Basic Law: The Jewish Nation-State,” which, he argues, calls for a shift in how one conceptualizes the Israeli regime on both sides of the Green Line. He contends the Israeli regime faces questions about its legitimacy following the enactment of this racist legislation.

“I understood, firsthand, what it means to hold the monopoly of violence,” Maya Avis says of the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians living in umm al-Hiran village in the Negev last week. What does it say when the only witnesses who count are Ashkenazi Jews?