[News] Israel's Negev 'frontier'

[Anti-Imperialist News]

Israel's Negev 'frontier'

  By Ben White
http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2010/04/20104592655951622.html


On this year's Land Day, tens of thousands of 
Palestinian citizens of Israel marched in 
Sakhnin, an Israeli city in the Lower Galilee, to 
protest against past and present systematic 
discrimination. But with the focus on Israel's 
policies of land confiscation, there was 
significance in a second protest that day.

In the Negev (referred to as al-Naqab by 
Palestinian Bedouins), over 3,000 attended a 
rally at al-Araqib, an 'unrecognised' Palestinian 
Bedouin village whose lands are being targeted by 
the familiar partnership of the Israeli state and the Jewish National Fund.

The historical context for the crisis facing 
Palestinian Bedouins today is important, as the 
Israeli government and Zionist groups try to 
propagate the idea that the problems, so far as 
they exist, are 'humanitarian' or 'cultural'.

Even the category of 'Bedouin' is historically 
and politically loaded, with many disputing what 
they see as an Israeli 'divide and rule' strategy towards the Palestinians.

Alienated and 'unrecognised'

During the Nakba, the vast majority of the 
Palestinian Bedouins in the Negev - from a 
pre-1948 population of 65,000 to 100,000 - were 
expelled. Those who remained were forcibly 
concentrated by the Israeli military in an area known as the 'siyag' (closure).

The military regime experienced by Palestinian 
citizens until 1966 meant further piecemeal 
expulsions, expropriation of land, and 
restrictions on movement. Ultimately, only 19 out of 95 tribes remained.

The defining dynamic between the Israeli state 
and its Palestinian minority has been the 
expropriation of Arab land and its transfer to state or Jewish ownership.

Israel refused to recognise the land rights of 
the Palestinian Bedouins, who today are alienated 
from almost all of their land through a complex 
combination of land law and planning boundaries.

An estimated 70,000 to 80,000 Palestinian 
citizens in the Negev live in dozens of 
'unrecognised villages' - communities that the 
state refuse to acknowledge exist despite the 
fact that some pre-date the establishment of 
Israel and others are the result of the Israeli 
military's forced relocation drives.

These shanty towns are refused access to basic infrastructure.

One approach the Israeli state has taken is to 
create, or 'legalise', a small number of towns 
and villages in the hope that more Palestinians will move into these areas.

Yet even this policy, often presented as a 
'humane' response to 'Bedouin' needs, highlights 
a disparity: Jewish regional authorities and 
individual farms enjoy a massively lower 
population density compared to the space allotted 
by the state to Palestinian townships, which are 
ranked among the most deprived communities in the country.

'Developing the Negev'

The Israeli government, meanwhile, along with 
agencies like the Jewish National Fund and Jewish 
Agency, are preoccupied with the idea of 
'developing the Negev', and boosting its population.

In March, the 'Negev 2010' conference was held in 
Beir al-Saba' (Beersheva), drawing hundreds of 
politicians and business people, with the focus 
being attracting 300,000 new residents to the area.

Speakers included Shimon Peres, the Israeli 
president, Silvan Shalom, the Negev and Galilee 
development minister, and Ariel Atias, the housing minister.

Last year, Shalom held a joint press conference 
with religious Zionist rabbis to outline plans 
for increasing the south's population, with one 
of the rabbis stressing the need for a "Jewish majority" in the region.

Atias, for his part, has previously expressed his 
belief that it is "a national duty to prevent the 
spread" of Palestinian citizens.

It is not, therefore, hard to read between the 
lines when Israeli policy makers and Zionist 
officials from organisations like the Jewish 
National Fund talk about 'developing the Negev'.

Zionist frontier

The Negev is the location for classic, unfiltered Zionist frontier discourse.

The Jewish National Fund in the UK talks about 
supporting "the pioneers who are bringing the 
desert to life", while an article in the Zionist 
magazine B'Nai B'Rith called the Negev "the 
closest thing to the tabula rasa many of Israel's 
pre-state pioneers found when they first came to the Holy Land".

The idea of the 'empty' land sits uncomfortably 
alongside another important emphasis - 'protection' or 'redemption'.

As the Jewish National Fund's US chief executive 
put it in January 2009, "if we don't get 500,000 
people to move to the Negev in the next five 
years, we're going to lose it". To who, he did not need to say.

There were no illusions about the meaning of this 
discourse, and its consequences, at a February 
conference which brought together academics and 
experts specialising in issues facing the Bedouins of the Negev.

Through the seminars and discussions, one theme 
clearly came through: The relationship between 
the Palestinian Bedouins and the Israeli state was rapidly deteriorating.

A number of the organisers of, and speakers at, 
'Rethinking the Paradigms: Negev Bedouin Research 
2000+' were themselves from the Negev, where 
overcrowding, home demolitions, and dispossession 
are features of everyday life for Palestinians.

The conference was one of the first of its kind 
in the UK, sponsored by the British Academy and 
Exeter University's Institute of Arab and Islamic 
Studies and Politics Department.

Excluded from discourse

Western media coverage of the structural 
discrimination and discriminatory land and 
housing policies experienced by Palestinian Bedouins has generally been poor.

In a discourse shaped by Zionist and Orientalist 
tropes, the Negev is a vast, wild, desert; a 
frontier to be civilised. The 'Bedouin', 
meanwhile, are either invisible or exotic 
savages, objects of benevolent philanthropy.

Furthermore, the international 'peace process' 
has meant that the question of Palestine has 
become the story of negotiations between Israel 
and the Palestinian Authority. Palestinian 
citizens of Israel have been left out, a 
situation exacerbated by the media mentality of 
'if it bleeds it leads'. Core issues facing 
Palestinian Bedouins - land control, zoning, 
bureaucratic and physical boundaries of exclusion 
- are not considered suitable fare.

This nonexistent or weak coverage is regrettable, 
particularly as Israel's policies in the Negev 
towards the Palestinian Bedouin minority are 
highly illuminating for understanding the state's 
position vis-à-vis the Palestinians in a more general sense.

Moreover, tension is building in the Negev over 
Israel's continued apartheid-like policies. 
Palestinian Bedouins continue to resist the 
strategies of the Israeli state and Zionist 
agencies, through legal battles, and grassroots 
organisation, like the Regional Council for the Unrecognised Villages.

Perhaps one of the main kinds of resistance being 
offered by the Palestinians in the Negev is their 
determination to stay. This steadfastness is a 
direct refusal of a strategy of home demolitions, 
dispossession and Judaisation.

The recent protest in al-Araqib could only be a 
foretaste of things to come, as Palestinian 
Bedouins demand equality from a state seemingly unwilling to change.

Ben White is a freelance journalist and writer 
specialising in Palestine/Israel. His articles 
have appeared in publications like the Guardian's 
'Comment is free', New Statesman, Electronic 
Intifada, Middle East International, Washington 
Report on Middle East Affairs, and others. His 
first book, Israeli Apartheid: A Beginner's 
Guide, was published in 2009 by Pluto Press.

The views expressed in this article are the 
author's own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera's editorial policy.




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