The Bedouins in Israel's Negev Desert: Ubiquitous yet Invisible to the Dominant Society
We were standing on a hill at the base of a radio tower. To all sides we could see the beautiful horizons of Israel's Negev Desert. Scattered throughout the area one could see many settlements. They were ubiquitous, yet they seemed out of place. We were facing a number of unrecognized Bedouin villages — settlements consisting mainly of corrugated-iron and wood huts lacking the most basic needs. This place and time, overlooking the Negev, would become one moment that helped us widen our horizons as students in the field of conflict resolution. By participating in an experiential course from Nova Southeastern University, entitled Society, Culture and Conflict in the Negev in Israel, we left the theoretical safe haven of a U.S. university, where we were taught theories and engaged in role plays. We were in the field.
The aims of the course were to introduce us to the diverse ethnic communities in the Negev region of Israel, and to combine academic theories with a practical experience. During the two-week course, we spent one of the days traveling throughout the region accompanied and guided by the Jewish coordinator of the Negev Coexistence Forum for Civil Equality. Only a few days earlier we had arrived in Tel Aviv — the showcase of modernity in Israel. The social and ideological gap we encountered can hardly be put into words. The villages that we saw from that hilltop in the Negev were scattered throughout the desert adjacent to modern highways and beneath huge overhead power cables. To an unsuspecting passerby, they seemed like spots in the landscape.
The Arab Bedouin have inhabited the Negev Region for centuries. Their culture often has been romanticized in movies, literature and historic accounts. The term Bedouin has historically described nomadic tribes of the Middle East. These people have traditionally been associated with a pastoral nomadic lifestyle that includes raising livestock such as sheep, goats and camels. Over the last few decades, their semi-nomadic way of life and societal structure have undergone immense and rapid changes, as they have moved to a more sedentary way of living.[1,2]
Approximately 155,000 Bedouins live in the Negev Desert in Israel, with an estimated 80,000 of them living in 45 villages that are unrecognized by the Israeli government. These Arab-Bedouins are Israeli citizens. However, with respect to their political and legal rights, the Bedouins in the "illegal" villages find themselves in no-man's land. They are not granted rights to construct permanent housing, the names of their villages cannot be listed on their ID cards,[3] the villages appear on no maps, and the residents of these villages lack local voting rights, and basic services such as running water, electricity, garbage collection, roads, schools and health clinics. The Israeli government and ministries have stigmatized the Bedouins as "illegal settlers." As such, the residents of these villages live under the constant threat of their homes being torn down or having to pay fines for letting cattle graze on state-owned property.[4,5]
The other half of the Bedouin population in the Negev lives in government-created towns and find themselves in a situation only somewhat better than that of the Bedouins in the unrecognized villages. They are concentrated in eight towns that are characterized by high unemployment rates and the lowest income in the country. According to the National Insurance Institute of Israel, 52% of Arab Israelis live beneath the poverty line, many of them in the Negev region.[6] These towns also have poor educational facilities, thus perpetuating the poverty and creating situations in which the children of these towns are disadvantaged. This is another factor which strengthens the growing chasm between Israel's dominant Jewish society and the Arab-Bedouins. In essence, whether in the legal or illegal settlements, the Bedouins are hindered from living a life of their choosing, and are controlled by the Jewish-Israeli apparatus of state.[7,8]
Throughout the personal encounters that we had with members of the Bedouin population, not only on that day, but throughout our course, one central notion from the field of conflict analysis and resolution that seemed to best describe what we saw is structural violence.[9] Structural violence is defined as the ongoing and institutionalized deprivation of needs of survival, well-being, identity and freedom. Briefly stated, "...Structural violence...is inflicted slowly and in a chronic fashion, by keeping people in poverty...or preventing them from pursuing their chosen life on an equal playing field. Structural violence is built into everyday life, into the economy, a political system, and into the landscape."[10] And as Barak notes, it: "refers to the established patterns of organized society that have been institutionalized — rationalized and sanctioned — yet result in systematic harm to millions of victims annually, including disproportionately, members of the marginal classes of society."[11] Structural violence can be connected further to the concept of cultural violence. As Galtung tells us, cultural violence is used by one group "to justify or legitimize direct or structural violence... cultural violence makes direct and structural violence look, even feel, right — or at least not wrong... thus rendered acceptable in society."[12]
While these concepts capture an important aspect of the social world in the Negev, and issues of "legality" of settlements, at least concerning the Bedouin, they do not get at the roots of the status quo. This can only be done by taking an in-depth look at the complex power relationships that exist between Israeli governmental institutions and the Bedouin. These power relations are best understood in a historical context and in relation to the underlying values and ideology of Israeli society.
After the Holocaust, and after years of Jewish immigration from many countries from Europe to what was then Palestine, an independent Israeli state was created in 1948. The land, which is present-day Israel, was chosen for religious reasons and nationalistic ideological reasons, in what was termed modern Zionism.[13] While Zionism can historically be dated back to 1200 B.C., the modern movement that led to the emergence of Israel as a state was a response to growing anti-Semitism in nineteenth century Europe. The continuous immigration of Jews, when Palestine was under a British mandate, took place against the will of the Arab leaders and the local population.[14]
While both the Jews and the Arabs historically claim the region to be their homeland, the outcome of the 1948 War left the Jews with a state, and the Palestinian Arabs without one. The Arab-Bedouin that remained within Israel's borders after the war did not belong to the hegemonic secular Jewish Zionist society. The Arab citizens of Israel, and the Bedouin among them, had no place in the nation of Israel and were systematically led to live in the cultural, political and economic margins.[15,16] Over the years, the Israeli government moved the Bedouin from their lands, often settling and resettling them in closed military zones (throughout the mid 1960s) and then in specific small areas, denying them access to their former lands. As a result, the Bedouin of the Negev region have two options — to either move to one of the eight established Bedouin towns, which often do not have the room to house them or the infrastructure to support them, or to live "illegally," dispersed in settlements throughout the desert.[17]
In order to combat this structural violence and discrimination, and to establish relationships based on equality, Jews and Arabs joined together in 1997 to form the Negev Coexistence Forum for Civil Equality (also known by its Hebrew name, Dukium [co-existence]). The Negev Coexistence Forum is a grassroots organization that is built on the belief that social justice is only possible when people work together as equal partners. Approximately 30 Jewish and Arab volunteer activists regularly join forces to achieve this goal. In addition, Dukium has a network comprised of hundreds of people who participate in different activities and are kept abreast of issues of interest through their listserve and website (www.dukium.org). The Forum's members come from diverse backgrounds and include community leaders, educators, lawyers, academics and social workers and it is unique in that it is the only Arab-Jewish organization that focuses on collaborative coexistence in the Negev region.
Dukium has set as its main mission the advancement of full civil rights and equality for all citizens of the Negev. The Forum's projects are focused around a number of key areas ranging from immediate "hands-on" activities to long-term processes that aim for sustainability. These projects include: conferences on civil and legal issues concerning the Bedouin; written reports of infringements on civil and human rights; guided tours of unrecognized Bedouin villages; work days in unrecognized villages (e.g. planting trees, fixing up a nursery school, etc.); a joint Arab-Jewish cultural center; university student group activities; and international activism in UN institutions on the rights of Bedouins as indigenous peoples.
During the advanced practicum in Israel, we were privileged to see these "invisible places" and to hear "unheard testimonies" by community leaders and activists. We were privileged because we were warmly welcomed by members of Dukium and by Bedouin citizens of the unrecognized villages. We were privileged because we heard a discourse outside the dominant one, one that few Israelis, and perhaps even fewer tourists, hear. As we visited these "illegal" settlements, and heard from the head of the Regional Council for the Unrecognized Villages and Bedouin activists about the inequality, lack of social justice and infringement of human rights that these Arab Israeli citizens face everyday, we contemplated how, at times, a democracy can fail its citizens. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that all people have the right to recognition and equality without discrimination before the law.[18] Israel is a signatory of the major human rights treaties.[19] However, due to the government's treatment of the Arab-Bedouin minority, two of the major global human rights organizations, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, have expressed concern about the infringement of this population's civil and human rights.[20,21]
The stories told to us by our Bedouin hosts and our Jewish guide had an impact going beyond pure sympathy and empathy. We students had come to this experience with a body of knowledge and assumptions based on our respective personal and educational backgrounds. Coming to Israel as outsiders, we were able to listen to the stories without previous acculturation into the dominant Jewish-Israeli discourse. While we were very much aware that our knowledge of the area was limited, and that we were dependent on the perceptions of our Israeli hosts, we also felt that our neutrality offered us the opportunity to understand the power relations at work that might be harder for an insider to appreciate.
One experience during our trip to the Bedouin settlements made an especially deep impression. In one of the villages, which looked to be not much more than a small shanty town, the head of the village, who was a long-time social justice activist, showed us governmental demolition orders that had been attached to shacks. When he took us over to the goat pens, he even jokingly noted that the authorities had posted one such sign on the fence around the pens, but that the goats had eaten it. Our host wondered out loud if the goat was going to be arrested for eating government property. We were touched by his ability to keep a sense of humor as his home and village were threatened with demolishment by his government, which offered him no alternatives for residence.
As our informant pointed out, and as we heard from others during our stay in the desert, the authorities use the cover of legality to undertake demolitions within the unrecognized villages. The public discourse and disinterest can be easily explained — if it is the law, it must be right. The common knowledge as to the illegality of the Bedouin settlements is derived from a power context embedded in the social structure of society, which is framed by the rhetoric of the government. In Foucauldian terms, the constant interplay between societal power structures and the derived body of knowledge has led these villages to be defined as illegal by the Jewish-Israeli majority — a status, understandingly, not shared by the minority Bedouin inhabitants of these settlements.[22]
Meeting people located on all levels of the social continuum, especially the ones in the social margins of society, is an invaluable experience for any conflict resolution scholar or practitioner. Only when we start to question our knowledge concerning the definition of illegality, can we move in the direction of understanding the topic more profoundly. We must be aware that our way of thinking and the use of knowledge is the result of the social structure, which reflects power relationships.[23] When we work in the field of conflict and peace studies, we need to be able to bracket our implicit and explicit knowledge in order to hear, but more importantly, understand the often silenced words of the marginalized and disenfranchised. Simply placing what we read and hear in pre-programmed thinking patterns can lead us to acceptance of hegemonic discourse, without critically analyzing the knowledge we are being told to blindly accept. By listening to the diverse voices, but most especially to the voices of the marginalized, Western approaches for the resolution of inter-group conflicts, which are often narrow and ethnocentric, can be broadened and made more profound, thus leading to sustainable solutions that have the potential to benefit all involved. In their work on the Bedouin community, Al-Krenawi and Graham demonstrated the importance of cultural mediators, individuals who are highly accepted in and knowledgeable about Bedouin communities.[24] Dukium's projects, which are aimed at supporting the Bedouin community and opening up dialogue between Jewish and Bedouin citizens of the Negev region, provide such a culturally sensitive addition. Not only do they collaboratively work toward the achievement of their goals of enhanced civil liberties for all, they also stress the importance of listening to the local voices thus making their work meaningful for the Bedouin community.
[1] Al-Krenawi, A., & Graham, J.R. (1999). "Conflict Resolution Through a Traditional Ritual Among the Bedouin Arabs of the Negev." Ethnology, 38(2), 163-174.
[2] Cole, D.P. (2003). "Where Have the Bedouin Gone?" Anthropological Quarterly, 76(2), 235.
[3] In Israel, all citizens carry an identity card that has a picture and includes their ID number, name, birth date, address and nationality (Jewish, Arab).
[4] Khamaisi, R. (2006). "Environmental Policies and Spatial Control: The Case of the Arab Localities Development." Arab Studies Quarterly, 28, 33-54.
[5] Swirski, S., & Hasson, Y. (2005). "Invisible Citizens: Israeli Policy Concerning Bedouins in the Negev." Executive Summary [Electronic Version] from http://www.adva.org/NegevEnglishSummary.pdf.
[6] National Insurance Institute Israel. (2006). Retrieved October 4, 2006, from http://www.btl.gov.il/.
[7] Abu-Saad, I., & Lithwick, H. (2000). "A Way Ahead: A Development Plan for the Bedouin Towns in the Negev." Center for Bedouin Studies and Development and the Negev Center for Regional Development, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.
[8] Swirski, S., & Hasson, Y. (2005).
[9] Galtung, J. (1969). "Violence, Peace, and Peace Research." Journal of Peace Research, 6(3), 167-191.
[10] Bornstein, A. S. (2002). "Crossing the Green Line Between the West Bank and Israel." Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press. 6.
[11] Barak, G. (2003). Violence and Nonviolence: Pathways to Understanding. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. 113.
[12] Galtung, J. (1996). "Peace by Peaceful Means." Peace and Conflict, Development and Civilization. London: Sage Publications. 196.
[13] Almog, O. (2000). The Sabra: The Creation of the New Jew. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
[14] Kimmerling, B. (2001). The Invention and Decline of Israeliness: State, Society, and the Military. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
[15] Bickerton, I.J., & Hauser, C.L. (2002). A Concise History of the Arab-Israeli Conflict (4th ed.). Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall.
[16] Kimmerling, B. (2001).
[17] Boteach, E. (2006). "Background." Retrieved October 6, 2006, from http://www.dukium.org/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=44.
[18] United Nations. (1948). Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Retrieved October 4, 2006, from http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html.
[19] Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. (2004). Status of Ratifications of the Principal International Human Rights Treaties. Retrieved October 13, 2006, from http://www.unhchr.ch/pdf/report.pdf.
[20] Amnesty International. (2004). Israel and the Occupied Territories Under the Rubble: House Demolition and Destruction of Land and Property. Retrieved October 5, 2006, from http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/ENGMDE150332004.
[21] Human Rights Watch. (2001). Second Class: Discrimination against Palestinian Arab children in Israel's schools. Retrieved October 5, 2006, from http://www.hrw.org/reports/2001/israel2/.
[22] Foucault, M., & Gordon, C. (1980). Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings, 1972-1977 (1st American ed.). New York: Pantheon Books.
[23] Barak, G. (2003). Violence and Nonviolence: Pathways to Understanding. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. 113.
[24] Al-Krenawi, A., & Graham, J.R. (2001). "The Cultural Mediator: Bridging the Gap Between a Non-Western Community and Professional Social Work Practice." British Journal of Social Work, 31(5), 665-685.
The Bedouins in Israel: A Special Report
Excerpts from ACRI’s Comments on the Combined Initial and First Periodic Reports Concerning the Implementation of The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, November 1998.
Editor: Naama Yashuvi
Historical Background:
The State of Israel’s report to the United Nations Human Rights Commission in April 1998 stated: “The Bedouin population in Israel, particularly in the Negev Desert area, is perhaps the most disadvantaged single community in Israel in terms of per capita income, unemployment, and the level of infrastructure and services in their communities.” (Para. 851).
There are approximately 100,000 Bedouin living in the Negev today. Theirs is a native population, characterized in the past by a nomadic and rural lifestyle. Before the establishment of the State of Israel, approximately 70,000 Bedouin lived in the Negev. However, following the War of Independence only 11,000 – 15,000 remained. The Bedouin population, widely dispersed throughout the Negev, was consolidated by the authorities and concentrated to the north-eastern part of the Negev (a mostly barren area) known as the ‘Saig.’ The more fertile western part of the Negev was reserved for Jewish settlement.
Before 1948, Bedouin-settled land was not registered in the official lands registry. After the State was founded, the State carried out a series of land confiscations of lands settled and cultivated by the Bedouin. In addition, lands to which the Bedouins claimed ownership were defined as “Mawat,” an Ottoman ownership category that referred to uncultivated land a certain distance from a settlement.
As a result of the confiscations and the denial of legal recognition of Bedouin rights to the land under cultivation, the Bedouin were dispossessed from nearly all their land. The land was then registered as State land, or transferred to an agency of the State. The land formerly used by the Bedouin to survive, was allocated to Jewish settlement activities in order to promote the policy then in place of spreading the Jewish population. In the words of the anthropologist Yosef Ben-David: “The governments of Israel sought to realize Zionist objectives through the possession of most of the Negev, whose lands are the primary reserve of undeveloped land in Israel.
The planning policies of Israel’s governments have consistently and flagrantly discriminated against the Bedouin. Whereas the policy regarding the Jewish population has been decentralization and widening distribution, the policy towards the Bedouin has been one of concentration into the smallest possible area. After 1948, all of the Negev Bedouin were gathered into the Saig region in the northeastern part of the Negev, an area whose land was far inferior to the areas where they had previously settled. The Saig could not support the subsistence farming needs of the Bedouins, neither could it support their livestock. Even within this area, the Bedouin were not granted legal rights to the land, and they were not allowed to establish permanent settlements in accordance with their lifestyle.
Starting since the mid 1960’s, Israeli policy has been to concentrate the Bedouin citizens into seven townships planned by the government. This policy continues to date, and it is the basis for the most recent Regional Development Plan for the Negev.
A comparison with the planning policies applied to the Jewish population underscores the discrimination: in the Beersheba district alone where the vast majority of the Bedouins who live in unrecognized settlements in the Negev reside, there are 104 rural settlements for Jews, with an average population of 350 residents each. The total Jewish rural population in the Negev is approximately 36,000. On the other hand, the Bedouin population in the unrecognized settlements is estimated at between 50,000 - 80,000; and yet not a single rural settlement has been established or recognized by the State for this population. The result of this discrimination in settlement planning is that tens of thousands of Bedouin citizens live in sub-standard conditions in unrecognized settlements without enjoying basic services or local government.
Israel uses a ‘carrot and stick’ policy to encourage its policy of concentrating the Bedouin into townships. The “carrot” is allowing Bedouin to purchase plots of land for building a house at a subsidized price in the townships and to reach a compensation settlement with the State in return for their land claims outside the township. The “stick” is to refuse to recognize the Bedouin settlements outside the seven planned townships and to make life in those settlements unbearable through harsh enforcement of planning and construction laws. For the “crime” of illegal construction, houses are demolished and criminal sanctions are imposed. In addition, basic services are denied to these settlements, or they are provided at a substandard level (see sections on health and education). This includes connection to the water and electricity grids, health care, education facilities, and welfare services. Even so, only half of the Bedouin population has agreed to move to the townships. The others cling to their unrecognized settlements, despite the difficult living conditions that exist there. It should be noted that the State’s Report gives no explanation as to why the Bedouin’s housing needs must be solved in urban townships rather than in rural settlements. The State’s claim that the nomadic lifestyle of the Bedouin is the reason for not including their settlements in outline plans is evasive, since only a very small minority within the Bedouin population maintains a nomadic lifestyle.
Such discriminatory policies are clearly in violation of Israel’s Basic Laws. Neglect and discrimination deny the Bedouin population of their basic rights to an adequate standard of living, health care, and education.
According to the Law of Planning and Construction, any building in an unrecognized settlement is illegal. As such, residents of the Bedouin villages live in constant fear of a demolition order against their home. According to the same law, without a duly approved zoning plan, no building permits can be issued and the authorities can issue judicial and administrative demolition orders against those houses built without permits. In June 1997, 700-800 administrative demolition orders and 1,600-1,700 judicial demolition orders against Bedouins in the Negev were in force.A family whose house is demolished is left with no dwelling. The State does not investigate a family’s living alternatives before the demolition order is carried out. This is despite the State’s obligation to refrain from leaving people without a place to live as a result of eviction, and to secure alternative housing for anyone forcibly evicted from his home. In most cases, the residents whose house was destroyed build a temporary tent next to the ruins of their former home. Bills submitted by several Members of the Knesset to forbid the demolition of a building whose residents have no alternative accommodation, did not pass, due to the government’s objection. The State’s Report notes:“In light of the principle of equality, Israel cannot accept a wide range of illegal housing in the Bedouin settlements inconsistent with the general law enforcement level. Nevertheless, the government acknowledges the fact that illegal building in this case is done out of necessity. An effort is being made to reduce the implementation of demolition orders until a permanent solution will be found.”Although the State recognizes that illegal construction is carried out due to necessity, it does not refrain from destroying the homes of Bedouin who violate the law out of necessity.The State’s claim that all the residents of the unrecognized settlements were offered practical alternatives is far from the truth. Officials admit that the townships are unable to absorb the entire population of the unrecognized settlements. This has been said, for example, by the head of the governmental administration responsible for Bedouin affairs in the Negev, Mr. David Shoshani, in a meeting with Bedouin representatives, in June 1997.
Availability of Services, Materials, Facilities and Infrastructure (General Comment #4, Sec. 8(b)) Homes in unrecognized Bedouin settlements are not connected to the water or electricity grids, nor do they have telephone service or sewage systems. Some of the settlements have haphazard and intermittent connection to the water system, but the amount of water reaching the settlements falls far short of the residents’ needs. In other settlements, residents import water from tanker trucks, which raises questions about the quality of drinking water.There are no paved roads leading to the unrecognized settlements. As a result, emergency services cannot reach them quickly when needed, and access to basic services - health, education and welfare - provided outside the settlements, is difficult.Some of the unrecognized settlements are dangerously close to Ramat Hovav, Israel’s primary toxic waste dump. Many families live in tents and shacks, only a few hundred meters from the site, without any protection from the danger of fires, explosions, or toxic waste leakage. There are no prepared contingency plans for evacuating the area residents in case of a disaster.
Habitability (General Comment #4, Sec. 8(d))Because of the restrictions on construction in unrecognized settlements, and out of fear of attracting the attention of the authorities, many residents avoid building new houses or additions to existing ones, even when this becomes necessary because of the expansion of the family. As a result, conditions in Bedouin dwellings are severely overcrowded. Likewise, much of the building is from impermanent construction materials, which do not protect the inhabitants from the harsh desert climate.
Cultural AdequacyThe pressure brought to bear on the residents of the unrecognized settlements to move to the townships violates their right to dwelling in keeping with their culture and lifestyle. The Bedouin are a rural society, whose members have always lived in small and separated communities. The State’s refusal to recognize their rural settlements violates their right to housing that is culturally adequate. The State claims that the unrecognized status of the Bedouin settlements is the fault of the Bedouin themselves:“The right to adequate housing is recognized in Israel within the legal framework of town planning and local government organization. However, this does not mean individuals have the right to live any place they choose. There exist in Israel some 53,000 people, mostly Bedouins, living in settlements of all sizes, which do not fit in the urban and rural planning schemes designed by the relevant authorities under Israeli law. Such settlers consistently refuse governmental aid proposals for resettling in appropriate locations.” (p. 123)This determination ignores the fact that the lack of a planning framework for the Bedouin settlements in the Negev is a result of successive Israeli governments’ refusal to recognize the settlements and the policy of concentrating their communities in townships. Likewise, the only “appropriate locations” the government offers are the townships. This offer is not reasonable or practical for a number of reasons.First, this offer involves relocating people against their will and without just cause from their present settlements, which is sometimes on their family’s traditional land. Second, the relocation to townships does not meet the desire of the Bedouin to live a rural lifestyle, as opposed to an urban one, and it does not meet the standards of cultural adequacy and of diversity of housing opportunities. Third, the existing townships are not able to absorb the residents of the unrecognized settlements, whose total population is greater than that of the townships: there is a shortage of housing for the population that already lives in the townships, and the physical and employment infrastructures are inadequate and unable to meet the needs of additional people from outside the townships.In practice, the State recognizes that the current situation in which all the Bedouin are encouraged to move to the townships, is impractical:“Israel acknowledges that it cannot impose upon the entire Bedouin population an urban solution which would be contrary to its wish and traditional way of life.” (page 124)The State mentions in its report various decisions and recommendations that have not been adopted by the present government and which are not reflected in its policies: Ministry of Housing guidelines (formulated under the previous government) for establishing new settlements, including rural ones, have not been implemented. The recommendations of a parliamentary inquiry committee to recognize some of the unrecognized settlements have also gone unheeded (p. 124). The Report does not mention any intention to adopt those recommendations, and in reality no steps in that direction have been taken.The Report states that eight settlements have been recognized, and that “consultations over other small illegal settlements – mostly comprised of single families” continue (p. 126). Those eight settlements are all located in the north of the country. No settlement in the Negev where the vast majority of Bedouin live has been recognized. Furthermore, even in those cases where the government has made a decision to recognize a settlement, the decisions are far from being fully implemented. A zoning plan has not been approved, so that residents of these ‘newly recognized’ villages still have demolition orders issued against their homes, for building without a permit. Permits of course, are not possible until a zoning plan is approved.As far as the other unrecognized settlements are concerned, it should be noted that not all of them are small and comprised of one family. The unrecognized settlements in the Negev are diverse, and some of them are much larger than the average Jewish rural settlement. Some of them have hundreds and even thousands of residents, such as Al-Sayed and Abu-Kaf, both of which have more than 2,000 residents. It is not clear what “consultations” are underway in these cases. At present, the policy of the government is that all the Bedouin must be transferred to townships. As stated in the Report’s chapter on health: “the radical solution is their transfer to permanent settlements, which is current national policy.” (p. 156)
The Bedouin Population in the NegevAs stated in page 156 of the Report, the health indicators of the Bedouin are lower than that of the rest of the population. This is particularly expressed, among other things, by the data on infant mortality. The government’s policy of non-recognition for Bedouin communities outside of townships has led to a severe shortage of health services and facilities for these communities, as well as a lack of infrastructure such as running water and electricity which contribute to communal health and hygiene. This has directly impacted and contributed to the disparate and troubling gap in health levels among the Bedouin. In its answer to the question of the Committee the State continues to deny its obligations and puts the blame for this situation on the Bedouin themselves.
WaterThe unrecognized settlements are not connected to the water grid (see our comments on Article 11, above). Although the State claims in its report that “every Bedouin encampment is connected on request to the Mekorot pipe-system,” such is not the case. Only after lengthy struggles and negotiations have some encampments received such a connection -- but not “on request.” Additionally, these connections are usually inadequate and do not satisfy the water needs of the residents. Other settlements remain unconnected, despite repeated requests, and residents are forced to bring water in containers. Some of these unrecognized settlements, called “encampments” are actually long standing villages, with stone houses like Darajat, which still lack water.
Access to Health ServicesThere is a severe problem of access to health services in the unrecognized villages. Pre-natal and post-natal care centers offering preventative medicine, immunizations, monitoring of children’s development, and information for mothers – do not exist in the unrecognized settlements. Only after a petiton was filed to the High Court of Justice did the State agree to establish such centers in some of the unrecognized settlements.There is a severe shortage of general health clinics as well. Out of over 100 unrecognized settlements with a population of more than 50,000, only four have health clinics. Patients in need of medical attention must travel long distances over unpaved roads, with no public transportation available. Residents of Abu-Krinat, for example, have to travel approxiately 90 minutes to reach one of three clinics in the vicinity. This time and distance are unreasonable, especially when compared to the normal standards in Israel. The Health Ministry has refused to establish the additional clinics necessary to meet the needs of the Bedouin population. This despite the fact that independent health care provider services (of which every citizen in Israel is a member) have expressed interest in establishing clinics in unrecognized settlements in the Negev.
Health Care in the SchoolsIn most of the schools in the unrecognized settlements, the medical services required by law are not provided due to a shortage of personnel and the lack of nurses’ rooms.
Proximity to Sources of PollutionAs noted above, some of the unrecognized settlements are located near the toxic waste dump Ramat Hovav, where all of the toxic waste in the country that cannot be disposed of by other means, is stored. The site releases foul odors, and presents a health risk for the area’s residents. A recent fire at the site led to panic, and residents of the surrounding settlements fled the area – there was no support system of counseling and information that residents could turn to for advice. Although the fire did not endanger the residents, the absence of an official agency to turn to in times of emergency and the lack of contingency plans for evacuating the local residents in case of a major accident revealed itself to be a serious problem. Local residents report that following the fire, the number of miscarriages and pulmonary illnesses has increased to extremely high levels.
Pest ExterminationSome of the unrecognized settlements suffer from mosquito infestation caused by the open channels of sewage that run near and sometimes through their villages. Because there is no local government to turn to, no one is in charge of eliminating the mosquitoes. This is a serious problem and poses a health hazard as well.
