Right. So welcome, everybody, to the first meeting of the Israel Studies seminar this term.
My name is Lisa Simon and I'm going to be convening a seminar with Professor Yaakov Guy.
And today, we're very excited to host our first speaker. So to the Rosemary, we'll be talking about the Islamic movement in Israel.
And there's an assistant professor in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at the university in Dubai.
And she has been teaching there since 2015. She obtained her Ph.D. in Middle Eastern studies from university in Oslo in 2008,
and she also holds an amnesty in Hebrew and Jewish studies from Oxford.
So welcome back to Oxford. Her research is focussed on collective identity formation and religio political and cultural movements by
and for Israeli Jews from the Middle East and North Africa and by and for Palestinian citizens of Israel.
So we'll hear from two then and we'll have obviously some time for questions and answers over time.
Great. Thank you so much. And thank you both for arranging this and welcoming me here.
I was also going to say thank you to someone from the Middle East Centre for hosting me if.
But now I've said it on the record. So I think that it is a pleasure to be back here 20 years after I started my amnesty in Hebrew and Jewish studies.
And then, as we have been discussing my early research focus on the generally lesser known Mizrahi Jews.
And today I'm speaking also about something which is generally lesser known,
which is the Islamic movement in Israel for and by a lesser known part of the Palestinian population or a people,
which is Palestinian citizens of Israel.
So the Islamic movement in Israel was established in the early 1980s.
My analysis of this movement is based on ethnographic research,
composed of mostly interviews, observations, and they were conducted between 2008 and 2021.
And then the last couple of years, because of COVID, it was via Zoom or email.
So in this analysis, I had purposefully used a very sort of contextualised approach.
So I have studied and interpreted my observations of this movement and its activists and its supporters within their social,
political, cultural and religious reality.
So I believe that the context explains why a particular Islamist movement has developed in the way that it has,
basically sort of how it became what it is today.
So this movement's leaders, they operate between what we can say is two main points of reference.
There's the Israeli state and society in which it operates.
And then it is the Islamist ideology that informs its methodology and approach.
So as other Islamist groups, this movement is also inspired by and aims to infuse here in theory,
the state and in practise the society with Islam interpreted to fit modern circumstances.
As a U be explained. Islamist wants a cultural revolution inspired by religious sources,
and that this is in part a reaction to the westernisation of their Muslim rulers and politics.
Now, of course, in the case of the Palestinian Islamists in Israel, the rulers are the government of the Jewish Israeli state,
and the state represents them both the political domination and westernisation.
So I argue that in the case of the Islamic movement in Israel, Islamism is not only an ideology and methodology for cultural advancement and renewal,
but it is also a variant of a Palestinian political nationalism.
So the Islamic movement in Israel is fighting for its rights as a Palestinian national minority group, using an Islamist approach and methodology.
And this is very evident in their trifecta of goals, which is to protect the Palestinian people,
protect the Palestinian land, and protect the Palestinian holy sites from the foreign Jewish state.
And I will describe these specific goals in detail in a short line.
So I argue that Islamist groups and movements are never the same as each case.
Then of course it's influenced by and somehow accommodated to its particular context.
And this might seem very obvious to us, but actually it's conducting contextualised analysis, particularly of Islamist groups.
And movement is very important because and significantly too often Islamist movements are seen as a general expression of an ideology
or practise cutting across place and time without appreciations of the nuances and local reasoning for their individual development.
So in this case, the context, of course, an Israeli state and society, and this, of course,
has naturally and tremendously influenced the development of this particular movement,
both in terms of providing opportunities and in terms of imposing limitations.
My analysis aims to explain how then the leaders and activists of this movement take advantage of the possibilities provided,
as well as navigate the limitations provided by this context,
and also how they then interpret and instrumentalize the Islamist theory and practise in pursuit of their particular aims.
So therefore, it's important to start with a brief description of the predicament and situation of Palestinian citizens in Israel.
So Palestinian citizens of Israel are the descendants of the about 150,000 Palestinians who remained into in what became the state of Israel in 1948.
Today, there are approximately 1.4 and 1.6 million people.
Or you can say that they make up around 20% of the Israeli population.
And so their inferior position in this state as non-Jewish Arab Palestinian citizens as very well documented.
And they are described by both academics and by Israeli, as well as international NGOs,
as second class citizens who are treated unequally in almost every respect when compared to the state's non-Jewish citizens.
In addition, they're considered to be a potential internal threat due to their Arab Palestinian identity.
So for example, according to the legal human rights organisation Adalah,
they face indirect and direct discrimination in the legal system and in governmental practises.
This is obviously become even more pronounced after the Jewish nation state law,
which was introduced in 2018, which formally made Palestinian citizens second class citizens.
So it is within the boundaries and opportunities afforded as citizens of Israel and the limitations
imposed by this political system that the Islamic movement has developed and is conducting its activism.
The. So this Islamic movement is established by leaders who are educated in West Bank,
Islamic colleges that became available to them after Israel occupied these areas, as well as other areas as a consequence of the 1967 war.
So this war, as we know, had negative consequences for Palestinians in the West Bank, in the Gaza Strip,
but it also had unintended and surprisingly positive consequences for Palestinian citizens.
Why? Because from 1948 till 1967, Palestinian citizens were living under a military rule which had included a lot of restrictions,
such as curfews not being allowed to organise politically, as well as restrictions on employment opportunities.
And in addition,
it meant that they were isolated from the Arab world generally and from their Palestinian brethren who were in particularly in the West Bank,
in the Gaza Strip, or in any other Arab country as Arab countries considered enemy states of Israel.
So after 1967, Palestinians from inside Israel suddenly gained access to both the people and the institutions in the West Bank and in the Gaza Strip.
So the former head of the southern branch of the Islamic movement done very little talk about the branch branching later.
Ibrahim Sassoon, he described the result of the 1967 war as the beginning of the Arab population inside Israel,
despite the devastating military defeat for the Arab states and the ensuing occupation.
So this was because from then on, Palestinians from inside Israel could go to the West Bank, also the Gaza Strip,
and access Islamic and Arab educational institutions and culture that they had so far been been prohibited to access.
So then we had young men and some women who went there,
got educated and returned to their towns and villages inside Israel, and they began to provide study circles.
They give sermons, and they kind of started what was the grassroots beginning of the Islamic Awakening,
which led to the Islamic movement inside Israel.
And so it is in the early 1970s that we can observe the beginning of the small,
religious, grassroot oriented initiatives that grew into the movement that we know today.
The focus then was on Dawah, sort of spreading their version of Islam for first of the individuals,
then the larger communities, and then, you know, they hope the society at large.
So the aim was to strengthen the faith and observance of the individual and the sort
of practise and observance of the Palestinian Muslim community inside Israel then.
So I would I say that in 1988, we know that in 1983, Abdullah Darwish founded the movement as we know it today.
Some people would say the movement started earlier. Some people would have another date.
But this is a date that I think is the best to use as the starting point of the institutionalisation of the Islamic movement in Israel.
And he started as explicitly as a non-violent and countrywide socio cultural political movement.
So as I mentioned earlier, there's this trifecta of goals.
So the three goals are focussed on protection.
So protection of people, protection of land and protection of religious sites,
mainly inside Israel, but also in the occupied East Jerusalem, West Bank and Gaza Strip.
So let me talk first then about people.
So the Palestinian Islamic movement in Israel, they assist Palestinian citizens in many diverse charity campaigns to supply school materials,
food, financial support for orphans, widows, many other type of initiatives.
And also,
they focus on generally sort of improving the services for Palestinian citizens that are not provided such effects satisfactorily by the state.
So they do this on a local level through local councils or via the movement's many social and cultural organisations.
So they run kindergartens, food distribution to poor families,
educational organisations that offer tutoring to complement the national school
system or to provide them with the training to get into the university.
As you would know, it's really difficult to pass the university entry exams.
They provide income for single parents and also social and cultural organisations for, you know, spare time and free time activities.
So in addition to facing legal restrictions, loss of land and properties and lack of equal opportunities,
as many other representatives of the Palestinian citizens, the Islamic movement, also consider Palestinian citizens.
So is it around this sort of protection to be under real physical danger?
So protection of people goes to sort of taking care of them in their everyday life,
as well as actually potentially or addressing their danger that they face that they consider to be physical dangers.
So when I interviewed both leaders and activists of the Islamic movement,
they typically will focus then on what they perceive as dangerous towards Palestinian citizens, including the threat of population transfer.
This is a method to deal with the idea that Palestinian citizens constitute a demographic
threat to the Jewish state and is promoted by right wing Israeli politicians.
And they talked about the reality of the anti-Arab discourse, such as demonstrations in Jerusalem this fall,
where people were shouting Death to Arabs or this is also regularly chanted at football games.
Politicians such as Benjamin Netanyahu talk about the threat of the Arab voters or any many politicians to talk.
Israeli politicians will talk about Arab politicians as traitors.
So it's sort of that on the discourse level. Then they also mention the dangers of the violent actions by group of Jewish citizens.
For example, they mention the 2008 Akka riots or the 2014 so called violent price target crimes,
which was both against individual Palestinians and also against Palestinian property.
Another and important element which was highlighted in these conversations was the police violence,
especially after the killing of 13 Palestinian citizens by Israeli police in the early days of the second intifada in 2000.
So the Islamic movement then works alongside and sometimes in collaboration with other organisation that represents
Palestinian citizens to prevent these threats or assist Palestinian citizens kind of after after any of,
you know, any of these events. So victims mainly such as rebuilding houses or repairing properties after destruction.
And in practise, what they do is that they use this Islamist idea where you volunteer your not just sort of you know,
you don't just contribute zakat, but you support the organisation by volunteering your time and your expertise.
So for example, when they were rebuilding houses, some a lot of people would come just to kind of contribute with their manpower.
But the guy who was the engineer would come in and build a house and the person who had the bulldozer would drive a long way with this bulldozer to,
you know, so it's all for free. And also the volunteer work camp type ideology, which is very grassroot.
In addition, the movement also focuses on the 400,000 or so Palestinians in occupied East Jerusalem who are residents but not citizens of Israel.
This group is under increasing political as well as socio economic pressure.
They are cut off from their Palestinian natural set of Palestinian communities in the West Bank due to the separation wall and the checkpoint system.
And so to improve their financial situation, the Islamic movement encourages its supporters from inside Israel.
We could say to go shopping and use the restaurants in East Jerusalem to provide needed income for this group.
This is tied to to my next point of protection of the religious sites.
So how it works is that one of the things that is important to the Islamic movement is that on a on a weekly,
if not daily basis, Palestinians pray at the Al-Aqsa mosque.
Let's talk more in detail about the Al-Aqsa mosque soon.
But one of the things they do is to provide free bus services from almost any Palestinian, local, village,
town or city inside Israel to take and bring them to Jerusalem so they can go and pray at the Al-Aqsa mosque, but also shopping in East Jerusalem.
So sort of combines the two goals in one.
So the protection of religious sites then obviously focussed on Al-Aqsa.
In addition, they try to document and as well as to challenge the what has been done and
the consistent demolition and other uses of religious property inside Israel.
So for example, there are some mosques that have been turned into other purpose building, such as even a nightclub in Tel Aviv.
So the Islamic movement would then challenge this in the court.
And so to try to uphold the religious properties and identities of these places of worship.
They also protect and document Palestinian graveyards operated since 1948, where also they have been now re zoned for other purposes.
And then, of course, the Al-Aqsa. So the Al-Aqsa is the way that the Islamic movement sees it under the threat of threat from Israeli security forces,
from right wing Israeli politicians and religious and settler groups,
and especially the so-called temple movement that is working to rebuild the temple and to change the status quo.
Established in 1967 that preserves the right to pray on the Temple Mount or Haram al-Sharif to Muslims.
Now, as this mosque, of course, is the third holiest site in Islam by acting as its guardians,
the Islamic movement also positions itself at one of the religious centres of not just the Muslim,
but also the Muslim, but also then, of course, the Jewish world as it borders the Wailing Wall.
So the movement is active in the actual upkeep of the mosque, physically, practically.
And also once every year the movement arranges a festival because the Al-Aqsa is in Danger Festival.
It's not a fun festival that way. We think of festivals, but it's a gathering, so they ignore them.
Branch. We'll talk more about the branches later, but the Northern Branch would have yearly one in there in one farm until 2015.
They would hold speeches and rally support for the continued protection of the mosque.
And this festival is every year attended also by Christian clerics and representatives of other groups that represents Palestinian citizens of Israel.
It is not just an Islamic movement. I mean, this is not a movement initiated initiative,
but it is supported by a broader segment of the Palestinian, both inside Israel and in East Jerusalem.
The concern and focus on Al-Aqsa is, of course, very significant. Also these days we've just seen the violence,
fighting now between armed Israeli police and Palestinian civilians on the compound during this past summer dawn.
And currently there are lots of violence going on in the occupied West Bank.
Then the third focus was to focus on land. So the protection of land mainly stopping further annexation and confiscation of land.
Of course, land is at the very, very heart of the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.
So today, in the main focus of the Islamic movement as regards land,
is the protection of the Palestinian people in the Negev niqab that are that the state is trying to,
in a process of appropriating, using different methods and schemes.
And they're also working against house and home demolition in occupied East Jerusalem, as well as inside Israeli towns and villages in Israel.
They're very active in the land day demonstrations that happen every year in since 1976, in April.
And in fact, the young leaders, these young, educated, particularly men who came back in the seventies,
were amongst the first people to initiate the land day demonstrations by Palestinians in Israel.
In addition to these three goals, the Islamic Union works to promote an Arab Palestinian Muslim identity amongst Palestinian citizens.
And this is to offset the process of Israel ization.
So let's talk about that. Israel ization can be seen as a very briefly as as a two pronged process and some Sami Maha has defined
it as the natural process of being influenced by the culture and language of the majority since 1948.
Whereas Nadeem Rohana has then added a bit more critically,
that calls it an approach by the state to make Palestinian citizens more Israeli
through a Zionist focus in education that aims to make them more acquiescent citizens.
For for the Islamic movement. They are kind of attacking or responding to both of these brains, so to speak.
And they want to lessen, of course, their influences. How they do that is that they try to improve the level of Arabic amongst Palestinian citizens,
especially formal Arabic, because they live in a Hebrew speaking state and society.
And almost all higher education institutions are operating in Hebrew.
They also are very careful to tell or insistent on telling the Palestinian young generation the Palestinian historical narrative,
because this is, of course, not taught in the school state school system where they are educated and where
the curriculum is focussed on the Zionist narrative and then of course Islam.
But they are not just teaching Islam in order to islamise, which they of course are, but it's also because in between 48 and 1967,
there were very little available material to teach Islam, and no teachers were sort of re-educated to teach Islam.
So generally we see amongst the Palestinian population inside Israel that they have a sort of knowledge gap of Islam across the whole population,
and they're trying to sort of bridge that gap. So gradually, this movement has built a network of religious and social institutions across Israel,
catering to the needs of its constituencies such as nurseries,
social clubs, health facilities, afterschool educational organisations, soup kitchens, association for women, art and religious organisation.
And it is through its steadily growing network of these self-reliant institutions that mainly paid for by zakat and also some foreign donors.
I can't tell you more about them, because I simply don't know, because I'm not given that information.
But they do exist. But of course, everything has to go through Israeli banks and financial systems, so they can't be that suspicious, I suppose.
Anyway, so the Islamic movement then from the mid 1980s began to participate in local elections.
The movement entered the political arena in 1983 when it pachuca local elections in the town of Copacabana,
and in 1989 they participated in several local elections and won several seats.
Again, Ibrahim Sarsour, a previous leader of one of the branches, described this as a peaceful Islamic revolution in Israel.
Quite a nice quote. It has since run various municipalities and seen members gain power in several local authorities.
And it is important to know that the local political arena is has historically,
since the end of the military government in 1966, been the most important political stage for Palestinian citizens.
As this is the level which directly relate to their everyday lives.
So through their influence on local councils, they can work to improve services directly for their constituency,
such as water supply, sewage system, garbage services, roads, public parks and garden and social services.
So what the movement has done is that it has used its new political gain power
since the 1980s to improve directly improve the lives of the Palestinians.
And they are very popular at doing that because compared to other politicians on the local level amongst the Palestinian community,
they are seen as unrelated to Israeli Zionist political parties.
They're seen as uncorrupt on a sort of individual level. They are seen as not related to or trying, at least in the case of Olmert,
for him largely succeeding, to distance himself from this old command based political structure.
And also, they're seen as getting the job done.
This I heard from many when I interviewed Israeli organisations or represented the Israeli bureaucracy that
the Palestinian towns and villages that were run majority by Islamist leaders were the most functioning.
They you know, they they did they they got the job done, basically.
So people were happy. So it is based on this the trifecta of goals and the religious, ethnic,
national identity promoted by this movement in combination with this grassroots and political
activism that I described the movement's leaders and activists as Islamist Palestinian nationalists.
Let that sink in.
The movement then split in 1996 due to the disagreement of whether or not to stand for national elections for the Israeli parliament,
the Knesset, the northern branch. And now it comes said no,
arguing that it was not permissible to enter a non-Muslim political system and that
such a participation meant a recognition of the Zionist character of the state.
They also meant that as Islamists they could not enter and none a non-Muslim system that didn't send on Sharia but non-Muslim system.
The Southern branch, on the other hand,
argued that there was room for political compromise with non-Muslim actors when this constituted a local political context
and when this is the best way in which to promote and protect the rights and interests of the native Palestinians.
So since 1996, there has never been two branches, the northern and the southern.
These names only refer to the seat of the leaders and the sort of main city villages of the two branches.
But across the country it's not like in the north.
Everyone with the northern branch and in the south, everyone in the southern.
It's all a mix. And I would say every locality will have people who support both.
So it's not it's only because Sharia law comes from Omer Farhang, which is north of Kofod Kassam, where Darwish and Darwish came from.
Generally, these two places would be mostly northern and southern in general, but it's not not a rule as such.
So since yes, and from 1996,
the Southern branch has participated in national elections and has High Representative
in the Israeli Parliament on a list that it's called the United Arab List,
or in Hebrew, often alongside quite often on this.
This is a multi-party system and they often on the list,
they would sometimes have other political parties representing Palestinian citizens with them on the list, but sometimes not.
It's a little bit confusing coalition politics like this.
So as an indication, though, of the popularity of this list, it was the largest list representing this constituency between 2009 and 2015.
The Northern Branch, on the other hand, has only participated in local elections, mostly in the town of only five and only until 2013.
Then this branch has been under increasing pressure from the Government and its leader
Sharon Salat has been convicted in Israeli courts on several occasions for connexions,
with Hamas,
the Islamist organisation in the Gaza Strip and the occupied territories for inciting violence and for spitting at an officer all charges he denies.
The split caused a lot of turmoil in the movement and amongst its supporters, especially when I interview student activists.
They are very much against the split and they thought it was a huge distraction from
the actual joint goals and activism and they would like to see a reunification.
There has been talks of reunifications and attempts, but it never came to anything.
And things that are mentioned as problematic is, of course, now this, since it's since 1996, the institutionalisation of the split.
We'll talk about that soon, as well as the fight over who's going to be the leader when you have sort of two structures
of leaders and the fact that the leadership style between the two branches is very different.
So the southern branch has new elections for leader every four years, whereas the Northern Branch has kept the leaders since 1996 and onwards.
So these are some of the differences that cause these discussions not to bear any fruit.
So basically at the grassroots level, what has happened is that we have the creation of what I call mirrored organisation.
So there is all these organisation that cater to the needs of the population.
Now we have one for the southern, one for the northern. So you have one Alexios in Danger Festival in one farm and one anchor for custom.
You have one association for use for the Northern Branch and one for the Southern Branch.
So that's also at camp level. Israeli universities you will have to organisation representing Islamist students interest, not one.
So basically these mirrored organisation compete over both supporters as well as funding.
Now since the split, most academic writing in media reporting on the movement would describe the Northern
Branch as a radical fringe rejection to participate in the national election.
And I assume also due to the more vocal and direct language of its leaders, should isolate and come out.
Khatib. And it describes the Southern branches moderate because of its participation and the more conciliatory approach,
especially as practised by the first leader,
Abdullah Darwish, who was quite active in interreligious dialogue and often participated in Israeli media,
speaking Hebrew and was sort of very much seen as an as an open.
Minded. Palestinian representative.
Now, I disagree with this terminology. I don't find it very helpful.
I find that it is invested with meaning associated with other Islamist movements and thus implying
ideological stance and political conduct that doesn't necessarily reflect these two branches.
And also, I think it's unhelpful because there is no agreed upon definition of what does it mean moderate or what does it mean radical?
How do we measure it? And therefore, anyone, me, the writer or you, the reader hopefully can, you know, put into it any content that you find fit.
And we might not even agree on what we're talking about. And then I think it just leads to more confusion rather than more understanding.
So therefore, you know, if you're saying that people are moderate, is it because of their acceptance of democratic principles?
Is that liberal rights rejection of violence? Or is are we talking about the reaction to state ideology or practises or interpretations of Islam?
And in which case, if we're talking about what is radical Islam is that often it's described as
being determined by the threat that an Islamist group is adjudged to pose.
The question is who is it posing the strength to and how do we consider any group a threat?
Like where are these lines? Therefore, I suggest that both of these branches are pragmatic.
Why? Because both have adjusted their ideology as well as their practise to fit into the Israeli state and society context.
They follow the state law, and till 2013, both branches partook in the election system and in the state bureaucracy.
Of course, then the Northern Branch only on the local level and the southern branch on the local and national level.
Both are non-violent and they modify their Islamist goal to the context.
This is interesting. When I was interested in interviewing again, this is sunset,
but I am so soon we were talking about, you know, what is your actual goal as an Islamist?
I said, you know, theoretically my goal is an Islamist state, but how could I have an Islamist state when I'm in the minority?
If I wake up tomorrow and all the Jews converted to Islam was suffering and then we, you know, we can promote our state, but this is not a reality.
So why would I even it's not practical to think about it in their practise.
The two branches are not that different except from their stance on national elections.
Both of them offer the same social, cultural, educational and religious services.
Leaders of both are vocal in response to Israeli actions, both inside Israel, but also in the occupied territories,
and both support charity organisations in the occupied Palestinian territories,
some of which are related and associated with Hamas, simply because Hamas controls whatever happens in the Gaza Strip.
There might also be other reasons we can discuss that later.
For example, also both leaders of leaders of both the branches where on the flotilla there's some boats that go to Gaza to help and support in 2010,
but only the law of the Northern Branch was given media attention inside Israel,
whereas Abu Dhabi's lot ahead of the Southern branch, nobody mentioned him.
So and this is a typical pattern. So the branch that is sort of branded as radical gets all the attention in the reporting.
I believe a more accurate description of the differences between them is to call the Northern Branch isolationist,
especially since 2013, where it has become extremely explicit because it no longer participates in local elections.
When I interviewed some leaders in 2015 before it was outlawed, I asked Why?
Why did you choose to stop participating in election, especially in 2013?
Because they were set to win and in fact their mayoral candidate chose to still
participate in election and stood as an independent and did win the elections anyway.
The leaders said that they had thought about it and they felt that they wanted to focus on activism, religious and social, and they felt bugged.
Down is a sort of a translation, I think, of by party politics,
and they felt that they were splitting the Palestinian people rather than uniting them.
And they didn't want to be part of this this political scene anymore.
Now, the Southern branch I described as integrationist, it is working within the system to try to change it.
And this has become even more pronounced recently, which I will address soon.
2015 broke two watershed moments for the movement.
The most dramatic was the outlawing of the Northern Branch.
Then Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu argued that this branch is undermined, the state incited to violence and had ties with Hamas.
So according to my interviewees in the branch, after the outlawing, of course, the this came as a shock.
They were waiting for something quite big and maybe losing some, some people being arrested or closing down of part of the organisation.
They were not prepared for a total outlawing.
As a consequence, all of these organisations that I've described that cater to the needs of the Palestinians inside, they were all outlawed.
So thousands of people working in these organisations were made unemployed overnight.
The state had not thought about this. Did not. Expect them to show up at the unemployment office the day after.
Did not have any idea how many people these organisations employed and many more thousands of course,
then lost all of these educational, social supportive organisations that they used in their everyday lives.
Palestinian citizens across the country and across the political and religious spectrum protested,
calling the decision a political, draconian measure to divide and rule this minority.
No one from the Northern Branch were charged with any criminal offences,
but the leader Salah has since been imprisoned twice for incitement to violence and he was last released in December 2021.
Also in 2015, the Northern Southern Branch joined the new parliamentary list, parliamentary list called the Joint List.
The Joint List includes many ideological currents and is unified only by the
centralising force of the ethnic minority identity and status of Palestinian citizens.
And interestingly, the original idea of Darwish when he wanted to join elections in 1996,
was to join in one list with all Palestinian representatives.
He never wanted an Islamist party anyway.
The joint list from 2015 was very successful.
It had 13 of 120 seats in 2015 and 2019 and then 15 seats in the 2020 election,
which doesn't sound that much if you don't appreciate how many parties, political parties there are in Israel.
But it made it the third largest list in the parliament.
This is huge. Despite the success in February last year,
the Southern Branches United Arab list round that we talked about split from the joint list under the new leadership of Mansour Abbas.
Abbas also then made close contact with right wing, the right wing Likud Party under Netanyahu during 2020.
And the idea was that Ra'am would support Netanyahu in his new coalition.
However, Netanyahu didn't manage to establish a coalition, and in June 2021, the Southern branch surprisingly joined the new Bennett Lapid Coalition.
This is only the second time in history that an Arab party is in any government or coalition in Israel.
Oh, but without ministerial positions.
And Abbas said he refused that because he thought it would be too embarrassing to walk around with which you would have to have a future minister.
So Israeli security before and behind you all the time.
He said it wouldn't do him any good. Now, why did Abbas choose to take the Southern branch's political party into the Israeli coalition?
He argues that it is in order to get more for his constituency,
and he was promised many millions earmarked for development of Arab communities inside Israel
and also was promised the recognition of free Bedouin unrecognised villages in the Negev Naka,
which would provide these villages with basic infrastructure that since 1948 they have not had,
such as water, sewage, electricity, roads, schools and health clinic.
According to Abbas, the reasons for his position is that now, as part of actual coalition,
the Palestinian citizens have political influence and the southern branch is the new sort of kingmaker in Israeli politics,
not just an ignored oppositional party.
He argued that he can use this position to secure funding for this constituency and to prove actual situation of Palestinian citizens,
particularly as it comes to planning housing, fight violence,
organised and organised crime in the community in addition to the previously mentioned issues.
These decisions and Abbas's Abbas as the leader of the Islamist party, has caused a lot of controversy.
This has been exacerbated by his comment that Israel is a Jewish state legally and demographically,
which has been a comment widely criticised by Palestinian citizens across the political and religious spectrum.
And also it was controversial that this spring he decided to stay in the coalition
despite the fighting on the Hatami Sharif Temple Mount compound at the moment.
Of course, Israel is now heading to its fifth election in two years and we are not sure.
But Abbas and the party this might be able to get above the threshold and get three or five maybe members of Knesset.
It remains to be seen in the informal conversations I've had with Palestinian citizens.
Now, recently, I get a I get an idea that a lot of people who wouldn't necessarily boycott elections
will boycott elections because they're unimpressed with all of their representatives.
And they want to give them a proper hint that, you know, we are not happy and you don't deserve our votes.
Yet Abbas seems to have and keep the support of his own southern branch of the Islamic movement by amongst the voters,
as well as the Shura Council, which is the sort of legislative council of the southern branches of political and organisational structure.
So in conclusion, my publication comes at a time with the southern branch of the Islamic movement is
at the heart of the current political development and public debate in Israel,
where the Northern Bronze features when its leaders are imprisoned or let out of prison or something, says something controversial.
But both branches are in the news, so they're kind of in the news for the opposite reasons.
You can say in a way that integrationist and isolationist and as such,
I hope and think my book is quite timely and that you will have time to engage with it.
Thank you.