The Arab minority is not priveledged, their communities often suffer from a lack of resources, including government spending, infrastructure and education. Those are the sort of things that segregation reinforces.
I think rylah's point is that one of the ways of addressing this disparity of resources is by "affirmative action", that is -- creating artificial privilege in the form of special consideration such as allocating additional resources, creating Arab-only communities, etc.
I would also question just how much Arab communities suffer from lack of resources and government spending, infrastructure and education and the reasons for that within Israel "proper" (not Area C). If the Israeli government deliberately underfunds Arab communities that is obviously a problem which should be addressed, but I'm not yet convinced that is true.
It's interesting pointing out "affirmative action" because there are parallel's to the US and it's traditionally underpriveledged minorities - native Americans, black communities. Difficult problems to resolve.
Israeli legislators have recognized the inequality in government spending - this article is from 2015 (I'm not sure where this legislative effort ended up) but it points out the inequities:
Israel looks to address funding gaps for Arab community with $3.9 billion plan
The largest ever government plan to advance the economic development of Israel’s Arab population will go to the cabinet for approval on Wednesday, but Israeli Arab leaders said they were skeptical the ambitious plan would be put into effect given the current atmosphere in the country.
The proposal calls for 15 billion shekels ($3.86 billion) in extra funding on top of anything now allocated to Arab communities in the state budget. The money is to be devoted to developing infrastructure, industry, education and healthcare. The details of the plan were ironed out over the last two weeks in discussions between treasury officials and MK Ayman Odeh, chairman of the Joint Arab List.
But Arab lawmakers and public figures have expressed doubts about the likelihood of the plan being implemented, especially given the current atmosphere in Israel. The cabinet was supposed to approve the plan on Sunday, but the vote was delayed amid opposition from Likud ministers, including from Culture Minister Miri Regev, who said the plan did not include mixed cities of Hafia, Tel Aviv-Jaffa, Ramle and Lod. Sources said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu felt uncomfortable approving the measure before the meeting of the Likud Central Committee Tuesday.
“We will be wiser after the cabinet meeting. Meanwhile, we are talking about promises and maybe a decision, which in the end has to be implemented,” said Sakhnin Mayor Mazen Ghanaim, who is also head of the Higher Arab Monitoring Committee. “If it is implemented, it will be a step in the right direction. Anyone who thinks this will lead to equality is wrong. It’s a step in the right direction on a long road,” he added.
The draft resolution details the gaps between Israeli Jews and Arabs. While Arabs constitute about 20% of Israel’s population, only 7% of the government’s budget for public transportation goes to Arab communities. Moreover, some 34% of those killed in traffic accidents are Arab.
Only 3.5% of industrial zones in Israel are in Arab communities.
According to figures for 2014, 75.4% of Arab men between the ages of 25 and 64 were employed, compared with 85.7% of Jewish men who are not Haredi. Only 33.2% of adult Arab women were employed, versus 79.9% Jewish women. The plan calls for spending 24 million shekels on incentives to employers and small and medium-size businesses in the Arab community, as well as a 25% increase in the budget for building daycare centers in Arab towns. The Finance Ministry will allocate 200 million shekels to the Economy Ministry for employment-counselling centers in Arab communities.
In education, only 59.5% of students in the Arab school system are eligible for matriculation certificates, as opposed to 75.1% in the Jewish secular and state religious systems. The plan calls for a program led by the Education Ministry to improve Arabic and Hebrew language skills, with an emphasis on speaking and writing, from kindergarten through 12th grade.
By 2021, the plan calls for Arab undergraduates at Israeli universities to reach 17%, which would be an increase from 14% last year, and a similar boost for post-graduate students.
In housing, the plan states that 20 percent of the investment in public institutions will be in Arab communities, and that 30 percent of the fund for protection of open spaces is to be earmarked for Arab communities.
But you actually make a really good point on protecting minority culture and communities in the face of large scale development and expansion and I don’t know the answer to that, it is a problem faced by many countries trying to balance indiginous communities with development. Should you force desegregation? No. But that raises questions.
How do you protect minority communities from being overtaken by majority expansion? Gentrification? Cultural dominance?
Its important to point out that, globally, Israel IS the minority community and it is trying to protect itself from being overtaken by the dominant culture in the area. That is part of the reason Israel feels the need to assert her intent to protect Jewish culture, the Jewish language, the Jewish religion and Jewish history though this sort of Basic Law. (This would be true even without the raging antisemitism in the world that makes it so much worse and Israel's own struggle with being held to double standards -- including the double standard of creating a constitution which is normative in all other places in the world.)[/quote]
Every nation is unique to some degree, some more than others - I don't think you can justify actions against a nation's minority communities by justifying that the majority is a world minority and needs to be protected. That almost seems like it would justify institutional inequality based on protecting the majority. I don't have a problem with recognizing the DOMINANT culture and language in a nation. But it also depends on how minorities - long standing residents who's communities preceded the creation of the nation - are treated. I think as long as Arabic enjoys a protected status, recognizing it's importance - it's workable. IMO - it's no different than French/English in Canada. What is questionable to me (and I don't think this is normative in most western nations) is legally segregated communities where minorities are barred from living But I'm not clear on whether that measure is part of the bill.
As a comparative example, France has placed constitutional protections on the French language because it is being dominated in the EU by English and German and France is invested in preserving its linguistic culture.
Interesting - I did not realize that.
The only way I see it working would be to allow minority communities to be protected in order to preserve their culture and viability, but keep the majority communities open as their culture is the culture of the nation. But that would be seen as unfair I am sure. I think America is a good example as to how these things have played out.
And this is exactly what Israel has done, legislatively.
Jewish communities are prohibited from rejecting applicants for residence based on ethnicity, religion, etc. BUT Arab-only communities are protected as such by the State. This doesn't tend to work so well in practice, and I think the US is a good example of that.
But another thing to consider is that the conflict itself creates significant problems. On some level, there is an underlying hostility and fear (both sides) that places like the US don't have to deal with. It makes the problem that much harder to engage with, let alone solve. I think it CAN be solved, once the conflict is set aside.
The US has an ugly history in that regard. And there is no easy answer to - how do you protect the integrity of minority communities without creating more problems? If the majority communities start barring minorities - then that is going to further disenfranchise them. IMO it's extremely important to protect the rights of minorities regardless of who they are, there are many many examples of the horrors inflicted on them from the dominant culture.
