Israel: Demography and Density 2007-2020
Evgenia Bystrov
gy Arnon Soffer
Chaikin Chair in Geostrategy University of Haifa Chaikin Chair in Geostrategy University of Haifa
Israel: Demography and Density 2007-2020
Evgenia Bystrov Arnon Soffer
May 2008 Reuven Chaikin Chair in Geostrategy, University of Haifa This Chair is concerned with issues of national security that contain a spatial expression, such as natural resources and their distribution, population spread, physical infrastructure, and environmental elements.
The Chair publishes position papers, offers consultation to senior decision makers, initiates research projects, holds study days and conferences, publishes books and scholarly works, and assists research students in the fields listed above.
It likewise engages in the proliferation of these matters at high schools and academic institutions. The Late Reuven Chaikin (1918-2004)
Reuven Chaikin was born in Tel Aviv, and became a senior partner in the Somekh-Chaikin accounting firm. He evinced deep interest in geography and geopolitics, and offered great assistance in these areas at the University of Haifa.
May his memory be for a blessing.
Prof. Arnon Soffer Holder of the Reuven Chaikin Chair in Geostrategy
Translated by: Murray Rosovsky Cartography Editor: Noga Yoselevich
Printed by: a.a.a. print ltd. http://geo.haifa.ac.il/~ch-strategy © All rights reserved to the Chaikin Chair in Geostrategy, University of Haifa. ISBN 965-7437-06-3 Printed in Israel in May 2008
Preface to the 2007 Edition
Since the publication of the last edition of Israel, Demography 2006-2020 in Light of the Process of Disengagement (Soffer and Bystrov 2006) the document Tel Aviv State – A Threat to Israel (Soffer and Bystrov 2005) has appeared. Its essence is the doomsday process of concentration of the entire Jewish population of Israel into the Dan bloc.
Meanwhile, five printings have appeared in Hebrew and English of the demographic account, and demand is only increasing. In public declarations at least, Israeli leaders (prime ministers, ministers, directors- general, mayors) and many others have applauded our conclusions and concur with the need to halt the condensing into 'Tel Aviv state' lest Jewish Israel be swallowed up.
The present updated study reviews recent developments in demography, and mainly warns that Israel is turning into the most densely populated state in the Western world; this will intensify the violence, the feeling of strangulation, the flight of young people from Israel, and its descent to the level of a third-world country. Evgenia Bystrov wrote about this in her study Israel between the Developed and the Developing World, likewise published by the Chaikin Chair in Geostrategy (Bystrov 2007).
This time too we return to what seems to us solutions that may still be workable in a democratic regime so as to change the disastrous direction in which Israel is heading. But we believe ever less that with the present form of government that has developed in Israel ways can be found to apply what is proposed. This is a grim and sad conclusion, and we counsel the responsible reader to weigh matters up with due consideration. Israel today reminds us of the story of the Titanic: the vessel sailed into a huge large iceberg but in its ballrooms the party went one, with refusal of the dancers to listen to the warnings. We have decided to try to change the Titanic's course. We have no passport except the Israeli, but we have discovered that foreign passports are to be found in abundance in the pockets of some of the dancers, particularly those issued by Western countries (the European
Union and the USA). Do their possessors plan to leap into the lifeboats reserved exclusively for the nobility?
We are not content with writing and a warning; we race from government department to government department, and make it quite clear that the data in the document entail a threat, and something may still be done. We also turn to you, Israeli citizens who care: read these things in a responsible fashion, and help us steer the ship of all of us to a safe haven!
Arnon Soffer and Evgenia Bystrov, October 2007
Preface to the 2004 Edition
Disengagement: To protect Israel as an island of Western-ness in a mad region
The booklet Israel – Demography 2003-2020: Dangers and Opportunities, published by the Chaikin Chair in Geogstrategy, sold out after two printings in Hebrew and English. The English version was distributed among the board of the Jewish Agency, the board of the world Keren Hayesod [Foundation Fund], the Anti-Defamation League, and leaders of the Jewish communities in France and in various cities in the USA: Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia, New York, and Los Angeles, and in southern California. Demand for the booklet is never ending – which goes to show that the issue of demography and its implications for the future of Israel are the focus of public interest in this country and among world Jewry. This may stem from the understanding of many – Jews and non-Jews – that Israel must remain an isolated island of Western-ness in this tempestuous and crazy part of the world.
The present book is intended mostly for two population groups that continue to deny the demographic danger, and on that account also deny the necessity of disengagement – the only course that will allow the state of Israel to continue to preserve its Jewish, Zionist, and democratic nature. These two groups – the extremist right and the extremist left – are augmented by a large group of Israel-haters who are bitterly opposed to disengagement, among them Palestinians, the Arab states, Muslim Europe, the anti-Semitic institution of the United Nations, and the judges of The Hague who present themselves as seekers after justice.
Disengagement has set out on the road, and there is no going back. Some cosmetic changes may perhaps be made in it at the request of the Israeli Supreme Court. This institution consists of judges who are not geographers or versed in security matters, and they would be better off refusing to discuss matters they do not understand or are not judgeable. In the same breath we say to people of the security system that in their plotting the lie of the disengagement line it would be most useful if they considered not only the day after, but also the processes that will unfold in the area in twenty years and more.
This small book attempts to present different aspects of the day after the disengagement, naturally with emphasis on the demographic changes it will bring about, all of which are positive.
Arnon Soffer and Evgenia Bystrov, September 2004
Preface to the 2003 Edition
This small book was first published in 2001, and tens of thousands of copies were distributed to the wider public, senior economists, senior people in Israel's security systems, and to politicians, prime ministers past and present, ministers, Members of Knesset, and directors-general in the government. The latter persons also held a penetrating discussion with the author. The book appeared in English translation, of which several thousand copies were distributed among the Jewish community and decision makers in the USA; the author met personalities in the American administration and also US ambassadors in Israel on this subject.
The responses surpassed all expectations. There was almost national consensus in Israel regarding the data and regarding the recommendation on unilateral separation from the Palestinians. Furthermore, after unnecessary postponements, which also cost much blood, the government of Israel adopted the document. Meanwhile several civil movements arose to struggle against the construction of the separation fence, and if that job is not done resolutely and quickly, it is not impossible that a political movement will sprout from these movements also (the author is not active in any organization or movement).
Since the interest shown by the public in the subject shows no sign of abating, and the problems under discussion in the document have only grown worse – all against the background setting of paralysis in the legislative and executive branches, we decided to publish a new and updated edition, intended for the Zionist and concerned community among the citizens of Israel.
Arnon Soffer, March 2003
Preface to the 2001 Edition In 1988 I published a document entitled Geography and Demography: Is This the End of the Zionist Dream? (published by Gestelit, Haifa). In it I analysed the significance of the visual geographic development in Palestine, and I warned of the danger of the disappearance of the Jewish Zionist state. In retrospect it emerges that the document I published contained two errors: I did not foresee the immigration of the Jews of the Soviet Union, and I did envisage a decline in the natural increase of the Arabs of Israel. The danger that I warned against then is as real as ever, and has even become more acute. Thirteen years after the appearance of the document, and despite the immigration to Israel of about a million Jews, not only has the demographic threat not diminished or disappeared, it has begun to materialize before our eyes, more rapidly than expected, and already today it assails many domains of our lives. And still the Israeli government displays total inertia in the presence of these dangers. Recent governments of Israel, and the Knesset as a whole, have not found time to take decisions on the national level, but are instead occupied with media gimmickry on a level of activity suitable for a Jewish community in a small town in Poland or Morocco. Considering this helplessness, and to avert the evil decree, a broad-based civil movement, conscious of the facts and the dangers, may perhaps be able to put pressure on the government to initiate and take hard national decisions in the framework of national unity. This monograph describes the present situation and offers a forecast for the coming twenty years. It clarifies that continued Jewish-Zionist existence is not a given, and that without preventive actions it is liable to end. These contents were formulated for the purpose presentation before various respected forums: a conference of the budget division of the Ministry of Finance, the Herzliya Conference, which dealt with national resilience and security, the Forum for National Responsibility (under the auspices of the Rabin Centre), the National Security Council, the board of the Jewish Agency, the Zionist Council, and other circles of decision makers on the various national levels. Arnon Soffer, March 2001
Table of Contents Preface to the 2007 Edition 3 Preface to the 2004 Edition 5 Preface to the 2003 Edition 7 Preface to the 2001 Edition 8 Introduction 11 Difficulties in implanting the issue of demography in the decision- making body as a whole, and among extremist groups on the Israeli right and left 15 Part One: The Demographic Dimension in Israel and Palestine 18 General 19 Processes around the borders of Israel 23 Demographic changes: Basic data 26 Demographic trends in the Jewish population 28 Demographic trends in the haredi population 30 The Arabs of Israel – Demographic strength translated into political and strategic strength 35 Danger of the loss of Jerusalem as the Jewish capital of Israel and loss of terrain, including Galilee, the Triangle, and the northern Negev 42 The Arabs of Judaea and Samaria and of the Gaza: What have they to do with Israel and its future? 47 Part Two: What Is Demography Doing to Society in Israel? 49 Immigration to Israel and emigration from Israel 51 Demography and the dissipation of democracy in Israel 56 Demography and the deterioration of the education system 59 Collapse of the national planning and the national infrastructures 61 The case of the water regime 64 The case of the transport regime 66 Part Three: What Can Still Be Done to Save Israel? 68 Sources 75 Appendix: The Bedouins in the northern Negev: Geographic aspects 2007 80 10
List of Figures, Tables, and Maps
Figures Figure 1: World population growth 1750-2150 11 Figure 2: Dangers to Israel owing to rapid demographic changes expected in the next two decades (2007-2025) 17 Figure 3: Relative poverty incidence (persons) according to group, in 1997 and 2005 32 Figure 4: Age pyramid of the core haredi population vs. all the Jews in Israel in 2001 33 Figure 5: Age pyramid of Arabs vs. Jews in Israel in 2007 34 Figure 6: Jewish migration to the centre of Israel 1998-2005 44 Tables Table 1: Changes in population size in the Middle East since 1800 12 Table 2: Population composition in Palestine (in millions and in percent) in 2007 and forecast for 2020 20 Table 3: Employment rate and average wage for a paid job according to population groups aged 65 and younger in 2005 32 Table 4: Immigration and emigration in Israel, 1990-2006 52 Table 5: Number of leavers from Israel according to age group, 1995-2003 53 Table 6: Number of leavers from Israel among immigrants of the 1990s from the former Soviet Union 53 Table 7: Population close to the borders of Israel 2003-2020 and forecast of demands for water 65 Table 8: Desalination plants in Israel (operational) 66 Maps Map 1: Distribution of the Palestinian people in Palestine 22 Map 2: Urbanization around the borders of Israel 24 Map 3: Crime along the borders of Israel 25 Map 4: 'Tel Aviv state' encircled by the Palestinian people in Palestine 41 11
Introduction
The world population today numbers some six and a half billion people. About 15% of them live in countries belonging to the developed Western world. Their population hardly grows, and in some of them, for example in Europe, it is actually decreasing. The remaining five billions live in developing countries, whose natural increase rate is for the most part high, and will continue to be high for many years to come. The developing world is expected to double in population in about forty years (see Figure 1). These data are the key to the future of the entire world, as they are anticipated to cause changes in the nature of the globe, migration movements, famine and disease, movement of goods, and wars, and they will perhaps affect climate change one way or another.
The Middle East, especially Syria, Jordan, Iraq, and western Land of Israel (hereinafter Palestine), is characterized by high natural increase. In fact, natural increase in these populations, which stands at 2.4-3.3%, was among the highest in the world in 2007. This means a doubling of the populations
10
8 2007
6 Developing countries
4
Population in billions Population 2
Developed countries 0 1750 1800 1850 1900 1950 2000 2050 2100 2150
Figure 1: World population growth 1750-2150 12
Table 1: Changes in population size in the Middle East since 1800 (in millions of people) Forecast Forecast Country 1800 1900 1950 1981 2007 for 2025 for 2050 Egypt 3.5 10.0 20.0 44.0 73.4 95.9 117.9 Turkey 9.5 14.0 21.0 47.0 74.0 87.8 88.7 Iran 6.0 10.0 14.0 37.0 71.2 88.2 100.2 Iraq 1.0 2.2 5.2 14.0 29.6 43.2 61.9 Syria 1.5 2.2 3.2 9.1 19.9 27.5 34.9 Lebanon 0.2 0.5 1.5 2.6 3.9 4.6 5.0 Palestinians 0.1 0.2 0.7 1.2 3.5 6.2 8.8 Jordan 0.2 0.3 0.5 2.0 5.7 7.7 9.8 Israel 0.2 0.5 1.5 4.0 7.3 9.3 11.2 Saudi Arabia 5.0 6.0 9.0 10.5 27.6 35.7 49.7 Oil principalities 0.2 0.2 0.5 1.0 10.8 12.2 16.1 Yemen 2.5 3.0 4.2 7.3 22.4 36.6 58.0 Oman 0.2 0.4 0.6 1.2 2.7 3.1 3.9 Sudan 2.0 5.0 9.1 19.0 38.6 54.3 73.0 Total Middle East population 32.1 54.5 91.0 199.9 390.0 512.3 639.1 North Africa 6.0 10.0 22.2 48.6 82.2 102.3 118.2 Overall Arab population of Middle 22.0 46.2 87.2 181.0 319.7 429.3 557.2 East and North Africa* Sources: Data of World Bank 1950, 1981; PRB, Washington for 2007 and future forecasts. Data for 1800 and 1900 are conjectured. Palestinians were counted without Jerusalem. * Excluding Iranians, Turks, and Jews. of the peoples of the region in twenty to thirty years (see Table 1). In Egypt natural increase fluctuates around 1.9-2%, that is, a doubling of the population in thirty to forty years. It is hardly credible that in so short a time these states will be able to double their infrastructures also: double the hospitals, schools, water supply and drainage, sewage, agricultural land, public transport, and all other needs of human beings in a modern society. And if indeed these states cannot meet the task of doubling the 13 infrastructures a fall in living standards and a feeling of despair among their inhabitants may be expected. A discontented population is dangerous, and it is most reasonable to assume that its members will resort to acts of extreme protest, from terror to an extremist Muslim holy war. The events of September 2001 in New York, the early attempt in 1993 to destroy the World Trade Center (Twin Towers), the appalling Muslim terror attacks in 2001- 2007 against embassies of the USA, Britain, France, Australia, Israel, Russia, and others, and against Israeli facilities all over the world, the shocking terror in Spain, Russia, Uzbekistan, Iraq, Indonesia, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, and Pakistan, and the extremist Muslim undergrounds that have sprung up worldwide, especially in Iraq, are striking testimony to our fighting the third world war: between extremist Islam, partly representing the developing world, and the West, representing development.
In the West many question marks are surfacing about the resilience of the West in this war; in a country such as France, which is inundated with a North African population, the proportion of Muslims has steadily risen. Today six to ten million Muslims already live in France (according to official and unofficial statistics), and Muslim natural increase is high; the rest of the French population is diminishing (0.4% natural increase in 2007). The world's rich countries are aware of this possibility, and presently are doing everything to help in the struggle to lower the high birthrate and to boost development, but are also taking steps in the event of their being unable to save so many poor people throughout the world. That is, they are preparing for a new war that will drag on for many years. The European Union is enclosing itself behind fences and walls to stop the waves of invaders from the third world. The invitation to Poland, Romania, and Bulgaria to join the European Union was done not out of liberal considerations but out of the need to bring working hands to Western Europe.
In small, densely populated Israel, all these demographic processes are taking place very fast. Within a decade enormous changes have taken place, so the effects are more evident than in Europe, and they have left their mark 14 drastically on all areas of life. Not surprisingly, today the term 'demographic threat' has become widespread and common in population research in Israel to describe the situation, and the construction of the separation fence, which has won wide support among the Jewish public, is a national project and part of the implementation of demographic policy in Israel.
This study sets out to analyse the dangers that Israel may have to meet in the coming fifteen years owing to the demographic developments within and around it. Figure 2 gives a general outline of these dangers. Clearly, in such a forecast, as in every forecast, there is an element of chance and the possibility of error. Whoever in 1930 made forecasts about the future of the Jewish people in the following two decades could not have foreseen what was about to take place. It would have been hard to predict that three years after the end of the Holocaust a Jewish state would arise. Those who in 1970 conducted forecasts about Israel for the next two decades could not have envisaged the collapse of the Soviet Union and the immigration of about a million Jews to Israel. Examples of errors in forecasting are not lacking. Yet for all their limitations, forecasts are essential for society generally and for decision makers particularly, as they make it possible to prepare for the future in fields where changes cannot be made from one day to the next. Examples are building schools, training teachers, training the army and police, providing water sources, building transport systems and establishing power stations – for all these, the accepted time for forecasting is fifteen to twenty years (the UN prepares forecasts for even longer periods, as shown in Figure 1 and Table 1).
In an array of social, economic, security, geographic, and ecological domains, what happens in Israel cannot be separated from what happens in the Gaza Strip, in Judaea and Samaria and on the borders of the other neighbouring countries. Therefore, we treat Israel's demography and in parallel Palestine's demography; we also discuss processes taking place close to the borders of Israel. 15
Difficulties in implanting the issue of demography in the decision-making body as a whole, and among extremist groups on the Israeli right and left
Today the primary threats to the survival both of our organizations and of our societies come not from sudden events but from slow, gradual processes of which we are generally unaware: the arms race, environmental decay, social and educational erosion... If we focus on events, the best we can ever do when we undertake forecasts is to predict a development before it strides so that we can prepare ourselves or react optimally (Senge 1990).
Projecting the content of this statement onto Israeli society yields a picture remote from the normative situation described: what is a burning issue for us is nowhere to be found on the world agenda, so it is not discussed by Israeli governments. This holds for the entire matter at stake: from Jewish– Palestinian relations to all aspects of the increasing crowding in Israel, whose dangers are no less; so much the more for the demographic problem.
The demographic clock is ticking against the Jews of Israel at great speed, yet surprisingly, in Israeli society no serious discussion of this issue has been held for many years. There may be various reasons for this: difficulty in digesting abstract statistical data; balking at the supposedly racial aspect of the problem; deep belief that all will turn out for the best (with the help of the Almighty); unwillingness to face up to the idea of partition of Palestine; a feeling that what is happening is a slow process that carries no threat; or the opposite – a tendency to fend off the subject precisely because of the threat inherent in it, which demands hard decisions. In 2005-2007 the Israeli right showed a clear and dangerous tendency to deny the reality and to ignore the relevant figures. One report even states that the Palestinians number one and half million fewer than the accepted number (Zimmerman, Seid and Wise 2006; Zimmerman, Seid, Wise et al. 2005). On the left too some refuse to read the map of the Middle East or to acknowledge Israel's parlous state. Such are Zvi Barel (Haaretz 30 May 2007) and Akiva Eldar in many of his pieces in Haaretz. Dismissal of this subject is bad; better that we shout out now so as to forestall the commission of inquiry that will inevitably come afterwards. 16
The various editions of this monograph have contributing to the appearance of the demographic issue on the world agenda. Most of the population take in the figures and their gloomy meaning. In 2007 two groups were left that doggedly refused to read the data and infer what had to be inferred from them. One is the segment of the left that continue to cling to the two-nation-state notion, whose significance, we believe, is the destruction of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state in the Middle East. Hence this segment's objection in word and deed to the separation fence – Israel's fence for life. The second group, relatively large, is that of settlers in parts of Judea and Samaria on the extreme right, and their supporters inside the Green Line – who belong to the Likud party, the National Union (Moledet in its various transformations), and the ultra-orthodox (hereinafter haredi; plural haredim) parties, including Habad, which in the past stayed neutral on the question of Greater Israel.
We have still not forgotten the destruction brought upon Israel by the obstinate ones, or the fools, in the person of Bar-Kozeva – Bar-Kokhba – and others. If this large group continues in its refusal to recognize the figures – as attested by the pretexts directed to us in writing or verbally – its members will be responsible communally and individually for the coming disaster. Proposals for a demographic solution on the lines of 'We'll transfer the Arabs of the Land of Israel to Irbid' (Benny Elon) or 'We'll move the Arabs of the Land of Israel to Bir Gafgafa in Sinai' (Efraim Eytam) are intolerable in terms of their applicability in 2007 and testify to a lack of comprehension of the global system. The truth is that most of the world (including Europe) is waiting to see the end of Israel, and only an American veto saves it every few weeks. A claim such as 'The Palestinians are leaving Israel' (Aryeh Eldad, Yediot Aharonot, 11 Nov. 2003 and the report of Zimmerman et al. 2006) is a further unforgivable delusion. Claims such as 'All the demographic data are wrong, because Israeli army censuses, like the Palestinian census in 1997 or 2007, are unreliable, and according to the correct demographic data millions of Arabs should be subtracted' (Zimmerman et al. 2006) attest to profound emotional distress.
The data in Figure 2 highlight the urgent demographic challenges for which Israel needs a truly gifted leadership worthy of the name. 17
Political implications Geopolitical implications Implications for Changes in the structure Trickle of Arabs from neighbouring quality of life of society in Israel – rapid countries into Israel Intensification of crowding: growth of the weak and Worsening of relations of Jews and Israel is the most densely anti-Zionist population and Israeli Arabs (who call themselves populated state of the persistent weakening of the ‘Palestinians living in Israel’) developed world, mainly middle class around the Tel Aviv core. Density is connected to Terrains such as the Galilee mountains, Change in the structure of the poverty, environmental the Triangle, the northern Negev Knesset to the point of danger poverty and a fall in and Jerusalem drop out of Israeli to the Zionist state and quality of life sovereignty, and the Jews of Israel degradation of the Knesset in cluster in ‘Tel Aviv state’, which very its different functions quickly is liable to turn into ‘Masada’ Deterioration of the national physical infrastructure Accelerated urbanization around and Steady undermining of within the borders of Israel requires Shortage of water and land democracy in Israel until its the Israeli army to engage in a new and Collapse of transport and elimination more complex kind of warfare murder on the highways Poverty and the rise of radical Islam Disappearance of the green Anarchy as a result of a in the neighbouring countries and in parks non-functioning Knesset, Palestine cause a rise in level of terror Decline of educational, absence of law enforcement, and extremism against the Jews of Israel cultural, social, and and paralysis of decision- economic systems making systems (since we The states of the region, including the first published this model in Environmental decline Palestinian Authority, show no signs 2000, anarchy has become and pollution of the of entering the global village, but the normative; the danger to environment: air, water, opposite. This has fateful implications Israel’s existence, among sewage, waste for the socio-economic future of the other things because of this, region and its attitude to Israel and the is more real than ever) West generally Collapse of national planning
Pressure increases Already in the present Signs of the third world Flight of the strong; on Israel’s borders in extensive parts of in all walks of life in chronic weakening of all matters, including Israel have no law Israel, where pockets of national vigour massive arms enforcement, and Westernization gradually smuggling Israel’s sovereignty is dwindle and cluster weakening around the Dan bloc Israel under actual existential threat, and more rapid than most of the public reckons
Figure 2: Dangers to Israel owing to rapid demographic changes expected in the next two decades (2007-2025) Part One
The Demographic Dimension in Israel and Palestine 19
General
The state of Israel can continue to exist only if it has a clear Jewish- Zionist majority, living in territory whose dimensions and borders permit actualization of the state's sovereignty and defence, and if it enjoys a quality of life that befits a Western society. Attainment of these two essential conditions for the existence of a Jewish-Zionist Israel is not self-evident; demographic processes in western Palestine threaten the capacity to realize them.
In all the chapters of this study a clear distinction is made between Israel that lies within the borders on the eve of the 1967 Six Day War, more or less, and the Palestine – the land within the boundaries of the British Mandate on the eve of the declaration of the partition of Palestine in November 1947.
In recent years the demographic factor has become increasingly dominant in determining the relations of Jews and Arabs throughout Palestine. In 2007 the Jews in the territory of Israel constituted 76% of its population. Because of the rapid natural increase of the Palestinian population it is expected that the proportion of the Jewish population in Israel, despite continuing immigration, will have fallen to 70.8% by 2020 (see Table 2).
The Palestinian population living in western Palestine, particularly in the Gaza Strip, is mostly poor, and its standard of living is liable to decline still more because its high natural increase is liable to swallow up aid intended to raise living standards, if it gets there. The gap in per capita income between a Jew and a Palestinian stood at 1:17 before the outbreak of the second Intifada (today it is 1:30), as against a gap of 1:4 between a US citizen and a Mexican, or 1:3 between a German and his Polish neighbour on the eve of the unification. Wide differences can also be found between Israel and its Arab neighbours, fluctuating between 1:15 and 1:4 or 1:5. That is, western Palestine shows the greatest economic gap in the world between two population groups. The meaning of this is a continuation and an increase in attempts to infiltrate into Israel by impoverished members of the Palestinian population so close to its borders, and also from other 20
Table 2: Population composition in Palestine (in millions and in percent) in 2007 and forecast for 2020 (on a minimalist assumption of the Palestinian population in the administered territories)
Year 1.01.07 2020 Population group In thousands In percent In thousands In percent Citizens in Israel Jews 5,415 76.0 6,300 70.8 Other citizens (mostly from the 310 4.3 400 4.5 former Soviet Union) Druze 120 1.7 160 1.8 Arabs, of these: 1,425 18.0 2,000 22.9 Christians 125 170 Muslims, of these: 1,300 1,830 Bedouins in the south 160 350 in East Jerusalem 264 380 Total citizens of Israel 7,115 100 8,860 100 Arabs living illegally in Israel* 220 300 Of these: in Jerusalem 100 Among the Bedouins 39 In the settlements of the 50 Triangle and Galilee Foreign workers 179 500 Total population living in Israel 7,514 9,660 Arabs residing in the 3,500 5,680 Palestinian Authority** Of these: in the Gaza Strip 1,400 2,340 In Judaea and Samaria 2,100 3,340 Total population living in 11,014 Jews amount 15,340 Jews Palestine*** to 49.1% amount to of total 41% of total population population Source: According to the Central Bureau of Statistics (hereinafter CBS), Statistical Yearbook of Israel; Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics data for Palestinian statistics 1 January 2007, with subtraction of 500,000 residents of Judea and Samaria who were counted twice. * Assuming that the fence will put an end to mass infiltration to Israel. Some of those residing illegally in Israel will be granted citizenship, so the number will remain as it is. ** Assuming that the fence is completed, and Greater Israel is longer be an issue, it will be correct no longer to count the Arabs of the territories as part of the state of Israel. They will be part of the some entity that will form in the future. According to Palestinian CBS data, in 2007 the Palestinian population in the territories was 2.5 million in Judea and Samaria and 1.5 million in Gaza, totalling four million. *** It is possible to speak of the total residents dwelling in western Palestine in the ecological and environmental context, which is never off the agenda in all borders that are not decided in the future also. 21 neighbouring countries. The unique demographic data of the Palestinian population show that it will not be possible to narrow these gaps in the near future, with dire implications for the borders or the fences that separate Israel from its neighbours. This also explains more than anything why the fence/wall is a matter of life and death for Israel, and not just a political extravagance. The high natural increase within Israel, mainly among the Muslim population, including the Bedouins, but also the haredi Jews, ensures that here too tensions and quarrels may be expected against an economic background, which will spread to the social, religious, and national planes.
Population density in Israel, which already in 2007 was the highest in the Western world – and without the Negev it is higher still, is liable to cause ecological decline in all Palestine, and its first casualties will be residents of the coastal plain (mostly Jews). In 2005 density in Israel was 341 people per square kilometre, in Belgium it was 346 per square kilometre, in Holland it was 403 per square kilometre, but in Israel without the Negev it was 845 people per square kilometre! This population, which is mainly Western in its culture and economy, is liable to react to the drop in quality of life by emigration to promising parts abroad, or to lose its national resilience if it remains. (This matter is discussed in greater detail in chapter 2.)
The demographic dimension also has implications for the national feeling. Already today Israel has a large Arab population, possessing a developed national consciousness, which sees itself an integral part of the Palestinian people whose centre is in the West Bank. The two parts of the Palestinian people are highly likely to muster forces strong enough to bring them closer, and when the day comes the Palestinians of Israel will act with their brothers east of the Jordan river for the founding a great Palestinian state from the Mediterranean to the Arabian desert. At present there are eight million Palestinians in this terrain, and in 2020 their population will number some thirteen million. Against this background ever tauter national tensions may be anticipated within Israel itself, and worsening difficulties between Israel and Palestinians throughout Palestine and Jordan. The 22
Partition plan border, 29 Nov. 1947 Green Line border Border of the distribution of the Palestinian people Arabs of Israel Bedouins of Israel Akko Other Palestinians Infiltrations in 2007 Haifa Tiberias Nazareth
Netanya
Shechem
Tel Aviv-Yafo
Jerusalem
Hebron Gaza Dead Sea
Beersheba
km
Map 1: Distribution of the Palestinian people in Palestine 23 events of September-October 2000, the publication of the 'Future Vision of the Arabs of Israel' (2006) and the 'Haifa Declaration' (15 May 2007) indicate a new possible direction in relations between Jews and Arabs inside Israel, which does not bode well for either population. In thirteen years a Jewish population of 6.3 million on the coast will be hard pressed to contend with the minority located inside Israel, which will number some two million Palestinians; about 5.5 million more Palestinians will be living in the other parts of Palestine, and a further 4.5 million will live across the Jordan river in the kingdom of Jordan. The total will be 11.5-12 million (see Map 1).
Processes around the borders of Israel
Decision makers, concerned with daily burning problems, do not take time out to survey the processes around our borders, which despite being gradual must be managed right now. Millions of Arabs are inexorably moving closer to the borders of Israel (see Map 2). This feature seems strange, for Israel's boundaries with its neighbours are war frontiers; still, they constitute a kind of magnet for millions, mostly poor and disaffected. This fact may have implications worthy of consideration.
In 2007 about four million Arabs lived very close to the borders of Israel. Across the line for a distance of about 50 kilometres live a further ten million or so. In less than twenty years this population will double, and reach seven or eight million on the border and twenty million at a distance of up to 50 kilometres from it. This increase will cause a rise in the demand for water (for domestic and agricultural use). Until recently the supply has been the Israeli water potential.
Another result of the enlargement of the population around the borders is the increase in activities of the criminal world around Israel and its neighbours (Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and even Saudi Arabia and Iraq). Israel serves as a bridge among these states, principally between the Levantine states and Egypt (see Map 3, and extensively Appendix 1 on the Bedouins in the south as a bridge). At issue here is the transfer of much war materiel, and drugs, human trafficking and sexual exploitation, theft of agricultural produce and 24
Border Latakia Built urban area 1967 Built urban area 1967-2006 Urban area to be built in the near future Area of dry crops and reservoirs outside the built area Tripoli Highway LEBANON Beirut
Sidon Tyre Damascus
Mediterranean Sea SYRIA Haifa
Irbid Tel Aviv Zarka
West West Bank Amman Gaza Jerusalem Port Said El-Arish Hebron
JORDAN ISRAEL
Suez Canal
Suez
Eilat SINAI Taba Aqaba
SAUDI ARABIA EGYPT 0 50 100 km
Map 2: Urbanization around the borders of Israel 25
Smuggling routes Terror activity
LEBANON Beirut
Mediterranean Sea Sidon Damascus Tyre
SYRIA Haifa
Crime along the Shores of Israel
Tel Aviv Amman Jerusalem West Bank Port Said Gaza El-Arish
JORDAN
Suez Canal ISRAEL Prostitutes Drugs Arms Drugs Refugees Arms Other Cars Electronic instruments Eilat SINAI
EGYPT SAUDI ARABIA
0 50 100 km
Map 3: Crime along the borders of Israel 26 infiltration of hostile populations (Sudanese, Egyptians, Jordanians, Iraqis and Palestinians from the east) into so-attractive Israel. The borders are wide open; the absence of law and order in the settlements springing up close to the borders and the 'no-man's-land' are well exploited by criminal elements in Israel. Further implications will be a rise in urbanization within and around Israel, and environmental decline in the area. This situation requires closure of the boundary, along the lines of the northern boundary of Israel, and a fence between Israel and the areas of the Palestinian Authority. In parallel, technological solutions for the defence of the borders have to be sought; these will be more effective that operating patrols.
The demographic processes around Israel have implications for all walks of life: political, geopolitical, cultural, and daily life. As illustrated in Figure 2, these effects combined lead to an actual existential threat. The demography and the reality of the Middle Eastern countries are pulling Israel's neighbours near and far towards a dangerous place, and Israel must do everything it can not to hurtle down with them. Israel must remain an island of enlightenment in this turbulent part of the world. The situation calls for greater separation between this country and its neighbours, in the form of physical barriers (fences), the most efficient means of defence and technological control, and a supporting juridical system. Till when? Till natural increase in the Middle East decelerates, the demographic momentum slows, the people of the region begin to take an interest in globalization and its benefits, and abandon their hopes of salvation through radical Islam and the destruction of Israel. Assuming that these things will indeed come about, we mean a period of twenty to thirty years at least! 'Tel Aviv state', the pivot of political, economic, cultural, demographic power, and the cosmopolitan air that prevails over it today, do not signal readiness for this. This matter must be placed on the world agenda, because our lives depend on it.
Demographic changes: Basic data
Since 2001 the Jews of Israel have been a minority in the population of western Palestine as a whole (that year showed a clear majority of the 27
0‑15-year-old cohort of Arab children in western Palestine). Inside Israel's borders the rates of Jews will continue to fall, despite the increment to the population through immigration of Jews (Table 2). This forecast is based on the following assessments:
Annual rate of natural increase in the Palestinian-Muslim sector is estimated at 3.0%, as follows: 3.1% among the Arabs of Israel and Judea and Samaria (population doubles in 20-23 years), 4.5-5% among the Bedouins in the south, and 3.5-4% in the Gaza Strip (population doubles in 12-15 years). This is the highest natural increase rate in the world (for comparison, in Egypt it is about 2%, in Turkey 1.3%, and in Iran 1.2%: 2006 data).
Annual natural increase of the Jewish population in Israel was 1.5% in 2007; with the addition owing to immigration of Jews the population growth rate at the start of the 2000s was about 2%, but it no longer is. In 2007 the number of emigrants exceeded the number of immigrants.
The significance of these figures is that the overall population of western Palestine, a small, dry land, numbered some eleven million in 2007, and in thirteen years it is expected to increase by a further 4.5 million residents, to reach 15-15.5 million in 2020. The great majority of these additional millions will be poverty-stricken and disaffected (Palestinians and haredi Jews) (Table 2). Any aid given to the poor population will be swallowed up by the natural increase, without being able to improve their living standards or the general living standard in the country. Corruption by the authorities on the Palestinian side is also liable to widen the already yawning social gaps, and population density will bring about ecological decline. The Western- Jewish population along the Israeli coastline has advanced technologies and high levels of income and living standards, but as time passes the area will steadily shrink and the population will grow smaller and become out of place on the scene. The inevitable result of all these factors is perpetual friction between two societies on various levels of (periodic) violence, and more extreme polarization between them.
Note that we have not taken into account here the actualization of the demand 28 for the return of the Palestinian refugees to areas of western Palestine, negative migration of Jews, and other possible factors that might lead to a crisis in the relations of the two peoples and population movements.
Demographic trends in the Jewish population
Annual natural increase in the Jewish population in Israel is, as noted, 1.5%. This rate is low compared with the Arab natural increase in Israel, but almost double that of the countries of the West. In the haredi population in Israel, as in the Jewish settler population all across Judea and Samaria, natural increase is not less than among the Arabs, but recall that at the moment these groups are no more than 20% of all the Jews in the country. The birthrate of the other Jews in Israel, most of whom are secular, is limited. Natural increase of 1.5% reflects the entire Jewish population in Israel.
On the face of it, factors are present in the world today that drive Jewish immigration to Israel, in the first place the swelling wave of anti-Semitism and persecution of Jews worldwide. However, the aging of the Jewish communities across the globe, the dimensions of assimilation in the large concentrations of Jews in the world, as in the USA and Canada, as well as in London, Paris, Buenos Aires, and Moscow, are moderating factors. Presumably too, these Jews would not wish to go to a place that seems to them like a violent third-world country – a condition Israel is moving towards. Even the immigration from France, which seems more realistic than that of any other place, is tardy despite the visits of thousands of French Jews to Israel. As for the Jews of Russia, new ones are not coming, and many among those who did come are going back.
In 2007 the rate of Jews in Israel (within the Green line, including east Jerusalem and the Golan Heights) was 76.0% of all citizens of the state, excluding illegal foreign workers. If we add to the Jews of Israel and population of non-Jews from the FSU, who immigrated by virtue of the Law of Return, with or without their Jewish family members, the proportion rises to about 80%. If we exclude from the calculation east Jerusalem, the proportion of Jews rises to 84% of the citizens of the state. However, if we 29 do not refer to the citizens of the state, but to the total population living in Israel in 2006, which includes legal and illegal residents – Arabs residing in Israel illegally and foreign workers, legal and illegal, who are expected to stay for many years – as happens in other countries of the Western world – the rate of Jews in the total population of Israel falls to 72%. This proportion is a cause of concern because it presents Israel as a bi-national or a multi- national state.
As for the future, the outlook for 2020 indicates that the rate of Jews among all the citizens of the state will drop to 70.8%, and among the entire population of Israel (i.e., including those without identity cards) their rate will plummet to 65%. In fact, we are talking about a bi-national state with a small Jewish majority. As for all western Palestine, to this calculation must be added the Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip and Judea and Samaria. According to the data, the number of Palestinians in 2006 was 3.5 million (we have cancelled out half a million on account of a double counting of the Arab residents of Jerusalem and other errors in the calculations of natural increase), the rate of the Jews throughout Palestine was 49% in 2007, and towards 2020 it is expected to decrease to about 41%. According to a report published by a group of right-wing people in 2005, and again in 2006, which ignores data of the Palestinian census and is based on various strange manipulations, the Jewish proportion throughout Palestine in 2007 was 56%, and in 2020, based on their data, it will reach 50% (Zimmerman et al. 2005, 2006). In consequence of the withdrawal from the Gaza Strip we no longer count the Arabs of Gaza among areas under Israeli control; in that case the Jewish population in the other parts of Palestine in 2007 was about 60%, but by 2020 it will fall to some 50%.
From this forecast the day is evidently not far off when Israel will be obliged to concede the territories of Judea and Samaria – which are populated mostly by Palestinians – and by then to have sealed the separation from that land and its people by completing the security fence. This will very likely remove from Israel several existential dangers: the danger of suicide bombers, the demographic danger, namely the inundation of Israel by 30 thousands of Palestinians trying to find a livelihood here or to realize the claim of 'return'; the danger of the thefts, as well as that of the deadly and developing connection between the Arabs of Israel and the Arabs of the territories. Certainly, the fence will greatly obstruct economic or other integration between Israel and the Palestinians, but we must realize that the socio-cultural, religious, and economic gaps between Israel and its neighbours are so great that in any case Israel has no chance of becoming integrated with them equitably and amicably in economic or other systems in the foreseeable future.
Even assuming that a considerable stretch of the fence will have been established, the security systems must well prepared for the demographic pressures not to come to an end. Various attempts to get through the fence are to be anticipated, mainly at the crossing points, and to enter Israel and harm it: by tunnelling, by sea, by hang-gliders and hot-air balloons, by curved trajectory firing, by poisoning wells, and by other means that human imagination can devise. In other words, the fence does not ensure a total seal, and many dangers exist from within also. Israel will therefore need to continue contending with the Islamic 'death culture' and with terror threats, continue to pursue Palestinian terror within, and in areas across the fences. This has implications for the time of the coming withdrawal from areas of Judea and Samaria, which will not be soon, for the practical chances of establishing a Palestinian state on the territories of Judea and Samaria, and for the removal of the settlements on the other side of the fence whose steadily growing numbers is liable to make the evacuation an impossible mission.
Demographic trends in the haredi population
The size of the growth of the different groups in the population in Israel has to be addressed because demography affects all branches of the country's economy. Changes in the socio-demographic balance in Israel are reflected in the increase or decrease of the size of the workforce, tax revenues and transfer payments to the needy sector, and even for the very economic 31 growth, standard of living, and quality of life of the entire society in Israel. The effect begins with the nature of the population in age composition, education, and employment rates in the economy. Compared with the countries of the West, Israel has a high rate of dependent population owing to the high rate of children and young people who have not yet reached working age, especially in the haredi sector and the Arab sector, chiefly among the Muslims (see Figures 4 and 5). The state directly supports the dependent population through social insurance and support in the form of money transfers to households by means of the National Insurance Institute and investments in welfare: education, health, housing, communal services, religious needs, and more.
In 2007 there were in Israel 7,115,000 residents, of whom about 8% were haredi (about 430,000 people). The forecast is that in 2020 the proportion of haredim will amount to more than 12% of the population, namely about a three quarters of a million people, out of all the Jews in Israel, and most of them will be children. This forecast is based on the following data:
In the early 1980s the average number of children of a non-haredi woman was 2.6, and of a haredi woman it was 6.5. Since then a trend to a rise in fertility among the haredi Jews and to a decline among the non-haredi Jews has been clearly evident: in 2001 the number for a non-haredi woman was 2.3 children and for a haredi woman it was 7.7; and in 2007 it was apparently 6-7. Thus, the haredi population has doubled in the last fifteen years. In the mid-1990s there were 280,000 haredim in Israel, of whom 150,000 were children. For 2020, a haredi population of three quarters of a million may be expected, of whom 570,000 will be children. Haredi children are at present 8% of the children in Israel, and in 2020 their proportion will reach 22% of all the children in the country. In the 1980s, 41% of haredi men aged 25-54 studied in yeshivas. In 1996 their proportion reached 60%. This demographic development sentences the haredim to grumble disgruntled poverty (see Figure 3). The high increase rate of the haredi population means a community that doubles in size every sixteen to eighteen years and rapidly outruns its resources: the haredi educational system, which does not supply yeshiva graduates with skills for the labour market; a low participation rate 32 in the workforce of men of working age; low current income to families will increase the dimensions of poverty and will hasten the demographic explosion (Gurovich and Cohen-Kastro 2004). Since the haredi sector expands faster than other Jewish sectors, and since a considerable part of the young age group is a dependent population and another fraction consists of a population of very limited employability (see Table 3), this population is becoming a burden on the shoulders of the supporting population. Every year of the last decade 10% of the national product has been allocated to the
70 1997 2005 64,1 60 54,2 50 39,3 40 35,9 30
20 12,3 13,9 10
0 Population except for Haredi Jews Arabs haredim and Arabs Figure 3: Relative poverty incidence (persons) according to group, in 1997 and 2005 (Excluding the Arabs of Jerusalem) (Source: According to Flug 2007; CBS data)
Table 3: Employment rate and average wage for a paid job according to population groups aged 65 and younger in 2005 Employment rate (percent) Average wage (NIS) Population group Men Women Men Women Arabs 55.6 15.9 5,347 4,101 Haredi Jews* 23.4 44.2 5,476 3,791 Rest of population in Israel 65.8 60.9 9,228 5,494 Total population 60.9 52.2 8,565 5,417 Source: According to Flug 2007; CBS data * It is difficult to single out haredim in the workforce survey and in the wages survey. The identifications here are based on one family member attending a post-secondary yeshiva as the final learning institution. 33
Haredi core All Jews 65+ 60-64 55-59 50-54 45-49 40-44 35-39 34-35 25-29 20-24 15-19 10-14 5-9 0-4 30 20 10 0 0 10 20 30 Percent Age Percent Figure 4: Age pyramid of the core haredi population vs. all the Jews in Israel in 2001 (Source: According to Gurovich and Cohen-Kastro 2004) needy public (Bank of Israel 2007), and every year the absolute sum of these transfers rises due to the increase in the product (growth). So far, the state has financed this singular lifestyle of the haredi population. But till when can Israel afford to be a welfare state and sustain dependent populations of such dimensions?
The proportion of employed people in Israel is even now very low among these proportions in the developed countries, and the proportion of unemployed is among the highest (OECD 2007). The unemployed population does not contribute to the product in the state, or to economic growth, and even constitutes a financial burden on the shoulders of the wage-earning element – and the sums in question are colossal. As the haredi sector grows larger, and its sons and daughters receive no schooling and training suited to meeting the challenges of the modern economy, and as they are denied social mobility and opportunities to integrate into the quality labour market, so the economic gulfs widen between that population and the rest of the Jews, and ever larger sums of money are needed for transfers so as to narrow these gaps and maintain populations that do not pay their own way at a decent living standard (in education, health, security, etc.). 34
Men Jews Women 90+ 85-89 80-84 75-79 70-74 65-69 60-64 55-59 50-54 45-49 40-44 35-39 34-35 25-29 20-24 15-19 10-14 5-9 0-4 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Percent Age Percent
Men Muslims Women 90+ 85-89 80-84 75-79 70-74 65-69 60-64 55-59 50-54 45-49 40-44 35-39 34-35 25-29 20-24 15-19 10-14 5-9 0-4 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Percent Age Percent Figure 5: Age pyramid of Arabs vs. Jews in Israel in 2007 (Source: CBS 2007)
Because of the differences in natural increase between the haredim and the other Jews, changes may be expected in the political map also. At present the parties representing haredi interests wield not inconsiderable weight in decisions on the government policies (Sheffer 2007). The issue of welfare policy arises in every debate on the state budget, and so far in most cases the haredi parties have been in the ruling coalition and have largely succeeded in preserving a situation of wide government support for encouragement of childbirth, infrastructures of religious education, and funding a haredi way 35 of life. This influence can only expand toward 2020, as Israeli democracy protects the principle of representation.
The Arabs of Israel – Demographic strength translated into political and strategic strength
In 2007 the Arabs of Israel (including the Arabs of Jerusalem) numbered about 1.4 million, being 20% of the total population of Israel. The natural increase of this population is among the highest in the world: 3.1% annually (in the Muslim population. This is due to very high birthrates, as in Kenya and other countries in Africa, and very low mortality by virtue of good health services and the fact that this population consists mostly of children and youth (in Judea and Samaria the increase is similar to that of the Arabs of Israel). The natural increase of the Bedouin who live in the south of Israel is even higher, reaching 4.5-5.5% annually, due to polygamy; most of the wives are imported. (Natural increase in the Gaza Strip was estimated at 3.5-4% in 2006; there the population is likely to grow in the next thirteen years till 2020 from 1.4 million to 2.3 million.) According to the forecast, in 2020 the Arab population in Israel will have reached about 2.0 million. Even without adding Druze, Christian Arabs, and the Arabs of Jerusalem to this population, in 2006 figures here is a rural and urban Muslim population of 876,000 people, which in 2020 will have reached 1.8 million (Table 2). This rapid enlargement has three implications on three distinct levels: the family, the municipal and the national.
On the family level the significance of the high natural increase is a large number of children and a small number of breadwinners, as the status of the woman is inferior and she is outside the civil workforce circle. The size of the Arab household is about five persons, as against about three persons in the Jewish household (including haredim) (CBS 2007). This means continuation of poverty as a feature of the Arabs of Israel (mainly Muslims), no chance at all of children getting proper schooling, hence none of the occupational skills required in the modern economy, working in traditional trades, and women not working outside the home. All these are factors of low income 36 and partly explain the ubiquitous poverty among the Arabs of Israel. High natural increase among the Arabs of Judea and Samaria and Gaza means perpetuation of poverty, continuation of attempts to infiltrate into Israel at any price, and at the same time an atmosphere of despair and desperate acts in those areas.
On the municipal level the low formal income of residents lowers the income from municipal and state taxes. Note that in the Arab settlement in Israel a complex and problematic situation has arisen: despite the rapid enlargement of the population, a dwelling culture has developed in this sector of detached houses, each on its own plot of land, not high-rise buildings; this makes for extensive spreading of the Arab settlements with single-storey houses. This issue involves state problems of absence of law enforcement, lack of a match between the master-plan and the situation on the ground, and extremely grave corruption in some of the municipal authorities themselves. The single-storey detached houses that multiply in the Arab villages are sometimes left without a proper infrastructure of roads and pavements, water supply, sewage, electricity and telephone lines, as well as education and other services. A by-product of this development is a picture of neglect in the settlements of the Arab sector, enormous demands for state aid, resentment towards the authorities, and a deep feeling of deprivation. The combination of demographic data with the reality on the ground does not bode well. The chaos in the Arab sector may well be irreversible, and promises 'chronic bankruptcies' of the municipalities in this sector, persistence of illegal building, worsening of the daily life of the population, and aggravation of the violence and ill-will towards the Israeli establishment. The recurrent demands to expand the boundaries of the Arab settlements, which would supposedly bring relief to the Arab sector, are spurious: enlarging the area in conditions of building detached houses will only lead to a worsening of an already grim reality.
On the national level the demographic growth makes for changes in the power relations between the Muslims, whose increase rate is high (mainly among the Bedouins), and the Christians and Druze, whose numbers are 37 relatively small. Certain settlement that in the past were Christian, such as Kafr Kana and Nazareth, have become largely Muslim. In other settlements, such as Abu Snan, the percentage of Muslims is steadily rising. Also in the mixed cities of Acco, Ramla, Lod, and even Haifa, where most of the Arabs who remain in it are Christians, changes are evident in the power relations in this respect (CBS data). Demographic increase also gives rise to a sense of independence and power, and impedes the enforcement of various laws in places where the Muslims are concentrated in large numbers. The combination of a sense of independence with feelings of frustration, whose basis is personal, religious, economic, and national, is fertile ground for the rise of extremist movements, and it stimulates and encourages processes of educational, religious, legal, social and political separatism, and also nationalist expressions, some of them ferocious, such as the revolt or quasi- revolt with the onset of the events of the al-Aqsa intifada (September- October 2000). One of the expressions of this situation is an appeal by the Arabs of Israel to external bodies and for international assistance on the grounds of deprivation. As we have seen, the situation in the municipal authorities is the product of a combination of actual inequality, high natural increase, and a culture of widespread building of detached housing. In 2006 a document was published entitled 'Future Vision of the Palestinians in Israel' (no longer 'the Arabs of Israel') under the aegis of the Arab settlement, which is in fact a challenge to the Jewish state in Palestine. On 15 May 2007 a similar document appeared under the title 'The Haifa Declaration'. No one has serious and practicable answers to relieve Jewish-Arab tension, for this is not socio-economically-based tension but a serious national conflict over a small, crowded territory of religious importance and spiritual value to either side, which is becoming increasingly desert day by day.
In the last thirty years, as a result of the penetration of modernization, the birthrate among the Arabs of Israel has declined. This is a development that on the face of it contradicts the forecasts of the various doomsters. And indeed, the picture is not so rosy, because of a phenomenon called demographic momentum. The fact that more than 40% of the Arab population in Israel are children and youth means that thousands of young couples are about to 38 enter the fertility period, so even assuming that every couple produces no more than two children, twenty years at least will have to lapse before any significant decrease in the high number of children born yearly will be seen in the entire sector.
The matter of the Arabs of Israel may be examined from the geo-demographic angle too. The poverty that we described on the family and municipal levels is accompanied by feelings of frustration, whose foundation is also nationalist. The Arabs of Israel cannot reconcile with Israel's being a Jewish Zionist state, which endeavours at all costs to be democratic too, in addition to which all the national symbols (flag, anthem, language some of the laws) are Jewish (for more on this see Benziman 2006).
If this were not enough, the Arabs of Israel are part of the large Palestinian nation living just a few metres away across the fence. They are also part of the Arab world, which will not come to terms with the existence of Israel. Also, the vast majority of them are part of the fervently religious Muslim world, which closes in on Israel on all sides. These data are translated into acts on the ground: illegal trade in war materiel, disregard for Israeli law over a wide range of domains, and geographic distribution that contains strategic threats to the Jewish settlement in Israel. We shall present this matter in the next section from a geo-strategic view.
The Arabs of Israel present six challenges according to a clear geographic division: in the northern Negev, in Jerusalem (which already today does not have a Zionist majority), in the Triangle, in the north of Israel, in the mixed cities (Ramla, Lod, Haifa, Acco), and as a complete whole. Next we discuss each section in detail.
The Bedouins of the northern Negev (for more detail see Appendix 1)
The natural increase of the Negev Bedouins, which had broken world records, began to fall following a cut in child allowances; this shows that the blame lies with the government of Israel, and that it must continue with the cuts. Be that as it may, the Bedouins double their population every 12-14 39 years! At present the Bedouins form a bridge between Egypt and the West Bank, between Egypt and Jordan, between Gaza and Jordan and the West Bank (a connection that could be fatal!), and between Egypt and the north of Israel (see Map 3). This linkage involves criminal elements, but also terror characteristics, so they are steadily turning into a strategic threat.
Because of the Bedouins multiplying in the northern Negev, the Jews are abandoning settlements such as Arad and Beersheba. We do not deal with the human tragedy of the Bedouin children themselves, only with the result, from the viewpoint of national security. Sixty years of neglect are liable to bring down national disaster on the south of Israel. The Bedouins' spread from the Green Line near Samu'a-Dahariya at the approaches to Hawra- Kasifa-Beersheba, towards Revivim-Ramatayim and borders of Egypt and Gaza, completes the noose formed of the Arabs of Palestine around the Tel Aviv space: it runs from Fasuta in the north through Galilee-Samaria- Jerusalem-Mt. Hebron-Bedouin territory to the Gaza Strip; if this tendency continues Tel Aviv will become Masada.
The Arabs of East Jerusalem
Jerusalem is the largest of Israel's cities in area and population (Jewish and Muslim). A third of the approximately 730,000 residents of Jerusalem are Arabs who live in the east of the city. Some 93% of the Arab population of Jerusalem have the status of permanent residents and only about 5% are citizens of Israel (CBS 2007). Secular Jews are leaving the city for the west (Mevasseret, Modi'in, Tel Aviv), haredim are moving to Mevo Betal, Elad, Modi'in, Bet Shemesh, and soon to Harish, and wearers of 'knitted skullcaps' are moving to areas in Judea and Samaria. This city, 'which is united together', the capital of Israel, the 'eternal city', remains poor, forsaken, and lost to the people of Israel – and it is only 60 kilometres from Tel Aviv.
The Arabs of the Triangle
There is nothing new in saying that the Arabs of the Triangle inhabit the narrow waist of Israel. The problem is that this waist is getting thinner 40 every day, especially in the area of Taibe–Kalansuwa–Tira, and if this trend continues we shall apparently be left with a strip whose width is from Hadarim junction to the Mediterranean Sea! Wadi Ara has ceased to be a national transport route and is instead an internal road through the town of Ara, which in 2007 numbered some 100,000 Arab citizens; beside it are 4000 Jews in Katzir and Mei-Ami. The connection between the Arabs of Ara and the Arabs of Samaria operates over a broad front of domains, some of them affecting Israel's national security, and this is well known. Mainly, extreme concern is for travellers on Route 6: it is not enough that 99.5% of the inhabitants of the area are good and peaceable Israeli citizens; if the 5% evildoers take the initiative, a calamity will befall this highway, which is increasingly becoming a kind of inner road through the Taibe-Tira- Kalansuwa area; and we have said nothing about the continuum of Baqa Sharqiya–Nazlat–Baqa al-Garbiya, which is tangential to Route 6.
The Arabs of the north
In 2007 about 39% of all Muslims in Israel lived in the Northern district. In that year the Jews of the Northern district were a minority of 49% and the Arabs a majority of 51% (CBS 2007). In the last decade and a half the Northern district has suffered negative grave migration of Jews to the centre of the country, while the Arabs have hardly migrated and remain in the north. The northern periphery is becoming increasingly weak, poor and neglected. We witnessed the implications of this in summer 2006 in the Second Lebanon War, when the status of the north changed from the 'northern periphery', which was to be developed – to the 'northern rear', which was to be defended.
Mixed settlements
The Israeli effort for the mixed settlements, in which good-neighbourly relations were supposed to prevail between Jews and Arabs, seems not to have succeeded very well. The mixed towns endure continuous tension between the populations that inhabit them, accompanied by conflicts in a national, economic, territorial, and cultural setting. Arab residents of the 41
Haifa
Tel Aviv-Yafo
Jerusalem
Beersheba
Tel Aviv state
Palestinian continuum encircling Tel Aviv state
Continuum of Arab settlements and spread of Bedouins
Map 4: 'Tel Aviv state' encircled by the Palestinian people in Palestine (Source: Soffer 2007) 42 mixed towns complain of deprivation by the state and displays of racism by their Jewish neighbours, while the Jewish residents think that the Arab presence turns the mixed town into an area where violence, drug trafficking, a culture of poverty, and disorder abound. A simple, minor matter, which could have been settled long ago, has been neglected and set aside, and has turned into a social problem essentially, which is more a nuisance than a threat.
The Arabs of Israel as a whole
We have already stated that the Arabs of Israel together with the Arabs of Judea and Samaria and the Gaza Strip are gradually enclosing 'Tel Aviv state', which is sucking into it the entire younger generation of Jews of the national periphery. This process, which speeds up the thickening of the Palestinian noose (see Map 4) will bring about the end of Israel in the first stage, and the end of Tel Aviv state in the second stage – on a timetable much faster than what the public imagines; they are lulled by the mirage of the stock exchange and the partying all around it.
Danger of the loss of Jerusalem as the Jewish capital of Israel and loss of terrain, including Galilee, the Triangle, and the northern Negev
In several territories, including east Jerusalem, central Galilee, Wadi Ara, and the northern Negev, the Arabs of Israel are already now the clear majority. In 2007, of the inhabitants of the Galilee mountains 34% were Jews and 66% were non-Jews. Ninety-seven percent of the residents of the Wadi Ara region are Arab Muslims, and in the Bedouin areas in the Negev around Beersheba the entire population is Muslim. The Jews dwell on the margins: in Beersheba, Arad, Dimona, and Kfar Yeruham; and in these places too the pace of Bedouin infiltration does not let up. If urgent action is not taken, already in the not distant future we shall have a fairly clear map of the coming partition of the land. The history of various minorities in the world, past (remote and recent) and present, teaches us that a minority that forms 43 a majority in its territory, and that possesses a national consciousness and a national leadership, will do everything in its power to realize its national desires – through autonomy, irredentism, or destruction of the state from within.
At the first stage, which is at its height now, the Jews of Jerusalem are running away and steadily converging towards the Dan bloc. In the last decade and a half more than 220,000 Jews deserted Jerusalem (as against only 100,000 who entered), most of them secular, and wearers of the knitted skullcap; these were the city's economic bedrock. They left behind a poor, dirty city, with dilapidated services and heavy feeling of loss of control, mainly in the Palestinian Arab sector. The Palestinians are not only swarming into the city in overwhelming numbers, they are also encircling it with wild construction from the Ramalla–al-Bireh area in the north, through Mikhmash, Anata, Arab Sawahara, the spread of settlements of the Judaean desert, as far as Bayt Suhur, Bethlehem, Bayt Jala, Battir, and Husayn. The funnelling of Jews into the Dan bloc is taking place from the far and near north too (including Haifa), and of course from the settlements of the Jewish periphery in the south (Soffer and Bystrov 2006); see Figure 6. In the second stage, when the Jews of Israel will be left in the greater Dan bloc, this will be a city-state with no hinterland, harassed on all sides by infiltrations and terror attacks, its days numbered, until absolute Palestinian Arab victory. Without a geographical solution for Jewish existence, debates about a Jewish, democratic, civil, equal-rights, bi-national state, and the rest of it, are of no value at all.
Before summing up, we should make an important and worrying comment. For years now, people have been presenting forecasts, with bleak pictures of the situation, and they invariably conclude with statements such as, 'If we do so and so, we shall solve the problems, wholly or in part'. Sadly, after decades of deep involvement in this matter, in our view we may no long speak about what should be done, because on geo-demographic subjects nothing is ever done in advance, attentively and with much foresight. This is a harsh thing to say, but it is anchored to reality. Those who lead and direct the state are 44
2001 1998 N N 0 5 10 0 5 10
Whole population 999-500 1,999-1,000 4,999-2,000 5,000 + Immigrants from 1990 on
N 999-500 צ 0 5 10 km 1,999-1,000 0 5 10 ק"מ 4,999-2,000
2005 2003
Figure 6: Jewish migration to the centre of Israel 1998-2005 (Source: According to CBS data, various years) 45 the super-rich, who wield enormous influence with the political leadership and are interested in a neo-liberal policy. Among other things their interest is in privatization processes, low taxation, and low wage levels (except for themselves). The all-Israel public interest is far from their hearts – how much the more so the Arab sector and what is going on there. They know nothing about the periphery and geo-demographic processes, and do not grasp that in neglecting these matters they are bringing quietus to Israel. We will allow ourselves the liberty of stating that for many of them Israel and its future are of no importance; they have second passports and can swiftly transfer their fortunes to Switzerland, Romania, Poland or the USA, with no national consideration. The even get assistance from Israel's senior bureaucrats, who are concerned with nothing but economic efficiency, and certainly not with distant places such as Yeruham, Afula, and Karmiel (on this subject see among others Gabi Sheffer on ynet 22 September 2007). Over the years we have seen the Israeli political regime increasingly turning into an oligarchy of which the bonds of capital and government, and the narrow interests of the super-rich, have become an accepted and agreed foundation.
Where is this state of affairs leading us? What will happen five years from now, twenty years from now? Analysis of the data will help us to answer, and then perhaps we shall know how we, ordinary citizens and those who care, must prepare the tools to meet doomsday – the event, perhaps the chain of events, that are the offspring of decades of neglect, which in the recent past has grown worse. Below we present two alternative scenarios.
The first scenario: a noose tightening around Tel Aviv state until its fall. The Arabs of Israel will be an integral part of the overall Arab struggle against Israel. The Israel airforce with all its might and the regiments of the Israel Defence Forces will be irrelevant in the processes we have described.
The second alternative: after major territorial and demographic withdrawals in the Negev, Galilee, Jerusalem and the Triangle, the Jewish vital force will bestir itself, and will bring about responses against violence. Already today the legal system in Israel is wrestling fiercely with the fairly complex 46 issues of the Jewish-Arab conflict. At times this struggle is unable to find the golden path between preserving individual freedoms, as a supreme value, and the security needs and the by-products of the complex reality of conflict on a circumscribed area. The life of two populations, separate but together, entails increasingly bitter friction as demands rise for living standards, land, and recognition of the civil right to settle anywhere in Israel. Here are a number of examples: in 2000 the Israel Supreme Court issued an order requiring the Israel Lands Authority to allocate a building plot in the Katzir community settlement to an Arab family (the Qa'adan family), whose applications to live in the settlement had been previously rejected by the admissions committee. This order sparked a storm in the public, and forced the government to seek alternative ways (bypassing the Court), that would ensure the maintenance of the status quo and would not permit Arabs to build their homes in Jewish community settlements (Bechor and Shmueli, ynet 8 July 2002).
In January 2007 the Jewish farmer Shai Dromi fired at four Bedouin thieves who had broken into his farm in the middle of the night. One of them was killed, and the farmer is presently awaiting his trial on the serious charge of manslaughter (Barshakovski, ynet 22 Jan 2007). In this case too, private draft legislation was submitted regarding the court's decision.
In 2003 Arab residents of the town of Lod appealed to the court against the building of a wall (which was decided by the government in 2002) between their town and the moshav Nir Zvi. The court's first decision was in favour of the moshav residents, who in that way could protect themselves against crime and raise the standard of living in their settlement. Submitting to pressure on the part of human rights organizations, the district court in Tel Aviv issued an interim order freezing the wall project (Stern, Haaretz, 15 July 2007). In November 2007 the Supreme Court ruled in favour of an Arab couple from Sakhnin and ordered though an interim order that a plot of land for a dwelling be reserved for the couple in the Jewish settlement of Rakefet. Previously their application to live in the settlement had been turned down on the grounds of social incompatibility between them and 47 the inhabitants of the place (Khouri, Haaretz 1 November 2007). As a result of these rulings, and many other cases, several Members of Knesset recently drafted a law intended to limit judicial intervention in territorial matters and to prevent the Arabs of Israel from living on land belonging to the Jewish National Fund (Maranda, ynet 18 July 2007). This is not all: the entire question of handling illegal building, non-enforcement of the law, and especially signalling to the public that there is no law in Israel, will almost certainly end in a new status quo: here and there to the benefit of the Jews, here and there already impossible to change history; in any event, it will not conclude in organized and civilized planning. Will this be done under a democratic rule? We doubt it. Be that as it may, the process is clear, the writing is on the wall. But experience teaches that we incline to act at the eleventh hour, not before.
The Arabs of Judaea and Samaria and of the Gaza: What have they to do with Israel and its future?
In the preface we stressed that if any intentions exist of annexing parts of Judea and Samaria and Gaza to Israel (as perceived by the extremist right), the demographic data (Table 2) will have immediate and fateful implications for the future of the Jewish Zionist state in Palestine: by 2020 the Jews will constitute a clear minority (41%) throughout all of Palestine. Excluding the Gaza Strip, the proportion of Jews in 2007 in Palestine was 56% and in 2020 it will be 48%. This too is not a state with a Jewish majority that affords the existence of a Jewish entity in the area; moreover, the five or ten following years have to be taken into account.
As for the perception of the radical left, which stands for making the state bi-national, it is clear that in the given demographic circumstances the Jews will be a minority, which means an end to the existence of Israel as a Jewish state. That is, demography makes it clear deterministically that it is impossible to annex the entire areas of Judea and Samaria to Israel, as per the vision of the extremist right, or to establish a bi-national state, on the well founded assumption that there will be no expulsion of the Arabs from 48
Palestine.
If we add to the Palestinian population in Palestine the Arabs of Jordan, for here is a single people which only the government and king of Jordan prevent from uniting into a single state – in 2007 they numbered about 8.0 million. In any event, in 2020 the number of the Jews of Israel will be about 6.3 million, as against twelve to thirteen million Palestinians throughout Palestine on both sides of the Jordan river. This is a most serious challenge in terms of strategy, which among other things necessitates continuous Israeli rule all along the Jordan valley. But beyond the purely demographic aspect, this will carry far-reaching economic and environmental implications. Urbanization, industrialization, water consumption, great volumes of sewage that will enter Israel, elimination of green areas for organized or lawless building – all these will exert a direct effect on Israel, and preparations for it must be made even now. Clearly, the separation fence, which probably will turn into the permanent border between Israel and Palestinians, will not put a stop to the many environmental effects, because the land is small and overcrowded, and soon its population density will be overwhelming, with all that this means. From the security aspects, the situation calls for protection of the buffering fence against terrorists, infiltrators, criminals, and heavy environmental problems. Part Two
What is Demography Doing to Society in Israel? 50
Rapid demographic growth entails, among other things, social decay, expressed in social disquiet, demonstrations, larceny, lack of law enforcement, violence, and principally in the dissipation of personal security. Since the Oslo accords, the condition of these things has considerably worsened, especially in the borderlands. Without doubt, a persistent situation of this kind is unacceptable to some of the Jewish citizens, whose culture, economy, and expectations are akin to those of citizens of the West, and who can be absorbed in the West without difficulty: they emigrate to countries wherein the quality of life is higher (the USA, Australia, New Zealand, western Europe). Even if a section of the strong citizens, the core groups, remain in Israel (because everywhere in world terror strikes and anti-Semitism flourishes), they develop ever increasing indifference to what is taking place in the country generally, and especially to critical matters such as voting in elections and enlisting for military service and reserve duty. Many take their money away from Israel, purchase dwellings abroad, and hold extra passports, of countries such as Lithuania, Latvia, Poland, and Romania, which during the Second World War were 'outstanding' in their treatment of their Jewish citizens. Some see these processes as the collapse of national vigour and even as national peril in the full sense of the word. Certainly, social decay is liable to enfeeble still more the state's stability, not to mention the many economic crises and the parasitism of hundreds and thousands, who sap the state's vitality (sometimes with governmental encouragement) and crunch the middle class, the backbone of democracy and the guarantor of economic prosperity in the land. Nor should one forget the dimensions of ruling corruption, the mayhem on the road, in places of entertainment, in schools, on the street and in the state border areas. These are the signs that Israel is plunging into the status of third world country, as has been already demonstrated (Bystrov 2007). Those of the young people of Israel who have been educated to live in a progressive and modern society will not settle for this. For many of them, this is no longer the beautiful Zionist state they dreamed of and fought for. The exiting of the strong is already at its peak, as we shall see next. 51
Immigration to Israel and emigration from Israel
The rate of population growth in a state is the annual mean change in population size in percent, that is, natural increase plus the migration balance (the number of those entering the state minus the number of those leaving it). The growth rate determines the volume of demand by the population for infrastructures (schools, hospitals, roads, sewage), resources (electricity, water, land), and workplaces. In 2006 population growth rate in Israel was about 1.6% owing to natural increase. The migration balance from 2002 contributed its relatively small part to this figure.
The number of Israelis living away from Israel (hereinafter leavers) is variously estimated today. Since the establishment of the state more than three million people have immigrated, and about one third of this figure have left.
According to the estimates of the Central Bureau of Statistics, in 2005 the leaver population was about 560,000 (CBS, press release, 14 August 2007). In 2007 the then Minister of Immigrant Absorption, Ze'ev Boim, estimated that at least 600,000 Israelis had left Israel over the years (Boim 2006), and this is the official figure applied by the decision makers and legislators in Israel (Elatov 2006). Some researchers even report that the number of Israelis residing permanently abroad amounts of 750,000 (Gould and Moav 2006) because in the last decade and a half a significant decline has been observed in the number of entrants and a certain rise in the number of leavers.
The characteristics of leavers of Israel in age, education, country of origin and seniority in Israel do not present a rosy picture. They include many young, educated people, and 1990s immigrants from the former Soviet Union.
The proportion of leavers of young age (15-44 years) in the last decade is 52% of the total leavers, and this age group's proportion in the total population of Israel is only 43% (see Table 6). This means that more than half the leavers are potential workforce and taxpayers in Israel for the coming two decades. 52
And since most Israelis living abroad (temporary workers or permanent leavers) do not participate in the civil workforce in Israel, the tax burden in the state is divided among the rest of the taxpayers; without doubt, this weighs heavily on the remaining, relatively few, working people.
Let us look at the seniority of the leavers in Israel. Between 1990 and 2004 the average proportion of leavers out of the 1990s new immigrants from the former Soviet Union was about 37% of the total leavers (see tables 4 and 6), while in 2005 the proportion of the 1990s new immigrants in the
Table 4: Immigration and emigration in Israel, 1990-2006 Year Entrants* Leavers** 1990 199,516 14,200 1991 176,100 11,400 1992 77,057 12,600 1993 76,805 16,400 1994 79,844 10,100 1995 76,361 16,800 1996 70,919 12,600 1997 66,221 12,800 1998 56,730 13,200 1999 76,766 13,200 2000 60,192 12,800 2001 43,580 19,600 2002 33,567 19,300 2003 23,268 16,300 2004 20,898 14,200 2005 21,180 11,000 2006 19,264 - Total 1,178,268 226,500 Source: Processing of CBS data, various years. * Number of new entrants in the given year. Table 4.2, Israel Statistical Yearbook, various years. ** Israelis living continuously abroad a year or more. Data of leaving Israel are the balance of outward migration: number of Israeli leaving for abroad minus number of Israeli returning from abroad in the given year. Table 4.9, Israel Statistical Yearbook, various years. 53
Table 5: Number of leavers from Israel according to age group, 1995-2003
age group 0-14 15-24 25-44 45-64 65+ Year 1995 5,000 3,300 4,500 2,200 1,600 1996 4,500 2,700 3,600 1,500 1,400 1997 3,900 2,700 3,800 1,200 1,200 1998 3,600 3,100 4,300 1,300 900 1999 3,400 3,100 4,400 1,200 900 2000 3,800 2,800 3,800 1,400 1,000 2001 5,700 3,700 6,400 2,300 1,500 2002 5,300 3,600 6,600 2,100 1,600 2003 4,100 2,800 5,800 2,400 1,400 Total 39,300 27,800 43,200 15,600 11,500 Total in percent 29% 20% 32% 11% 8% Source: Processing of CBS data, Israel Statistical Yearbook, various years.
Table 6: Number of leavers from Israel among immigrants of the 1990s from the former Soviet Union
Year 1990s FSU immigrants 1990s FSU immigrants 1990s FSU immigrant who departed from Israel who returned to Israel leavers of Israel 1990 400 0 400 1991 3,100 0 3,100 1992 5,800 100 5,700 1993 5,300 300 5,000 1994 5,300 500 4,800 1995 6,300 600 5,700 1996 6,200 900 5,300 1997 6,000 1,300 4,700 1998 6,200 1,200 5,000 1999 5,600 1,500 4,100 2000 6,900 1,500 5,400 2001 8,000 1,200 6,800 2002 9,700 1,200 8,500 2003 9,400 1,500 7,900 2004 8,700 1,900 6,800 Total 92,900 13,700 79,200 Source: According to CBS 2007. 54 total population of Israel was only about 13% (Israel Statistical Yearbook 2006). This means that the tendency of FSU immigrants to leave Israel is greater than that among the population as a whole. Furthermore, in this period the number of leavers among this population rose by the year. This tendency appears particularly worrying considering that in the last decade immigrants' workforce participation has been at a higher rate than that of the overall population of Israel (Bank of Israel 2007).
The main reasons for leaving Israel, in the view of 85% of the Israeli population (youth and adults) in 2004, was the country's economic situation and security situation (Arian, Ben-Nun and Barnea 2004).
The destination of many leavers, including those from the FSU, is the countries of the West. Some of the immigrants to Israel have actually returned to their countries of origin, with the stabilization of the economic situation there (e.g., Argentina, Russia, Ukraine) or as those states joined the European Union (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Poland).
Education level features in close correlation with likelihood of leaving Israel: people with academic education tend to leave more than those with poor education. Almost 4% of the 30-40 age group with a Master's degree and higher left Israel between 1995 and 2002, especially scientists, physicians, and engineers. Among the FSU immigrants the picture is graver still: 5.5% of immigrants aged 30-40 with a Master's degree and higher left in that period (Gould and Moav 2006). In Omer Moav's opinion, Israel is more attractive to someone who has not completed high school, and far less attractive to the educated, who have other possibilities. Educated people, who earn NIS 10,000-15,000 a month, incline to leave the country at a higher rate that the rest of the population also because of the tax burden. Similarly, labour-market opportunities in Israel are relatively limited, because most of the sectors in the country are not competitive and are not open to the intake of workers; the protection of some workers is at the expense of others. If Israel does not tackle the brain drain, and lets leading experts go, it will pay a heavy price (Moav 2006). 55
The desire in the various social groups to remain in Israel or to leave is also probed through opinion polls. In 2007 only about half of the 18-31 age group were certain that they wished to live in the country, as against about two thirds among the 32-61 age group and more than 80% among the 62+ age group. Similarly, only 59% of the secular publish wished to stay in Israel, as against two thirds of the traditional and religious public, and 87% of the haredim, who did wish to stay. Moreover, less than half (49%) of the people who identify themselves with the political left wish to stay in Israel, as against two thirds of those of the political centre and right. Only 47% of voters for the (left-wing) Meretz party in the 2006 elections wanted to remain in Israel, in contrast to some two thirds of the voters for Kadima, Labour, Likud, and Yisrael Beitenu parties (ranging from right-wing to centre), and to the voters for the ultra-orthodox parties Torah Judaism and Shas. So the chances seem high of finding adults and the elderly, religious and haredim, and voters for religious and right-wing parties among those who wish to remain in Israel; on the other hand, more young people, secular people, and voters for the left will be among those who want to leave (Philippov 2007). It may be stated with certainty that the latter groups are typical of the population of 'Tel Aviv state' – young people whose culture is cosmopolitan, who are devoid of Zionist roots, and who are probably ignorant of the essence and the geography of the Land of Israel.
The tendencies just described, on the objective level of occurrences as measured by statistical means and on the subjective level of public opinion, point to a trend of change in the Israel's socio-economic balance towards 2020. In the future, we are liable to encounter in Israel a relatively weak population, composed of a group of relatively young Jews with an affinity for religion, with many children and poor, a group of adults, and also elderly people in need of support, and an Arab population with many children. Will there be enough breadwinners and taxpayers among them? Will there be the workforce for conscription to the IDF and afterwards for reserve service? Will the young, the educated, and the excellent people wish to live in Israel? Who are the immigrants who in such circumstances will want to move to Israel? These are in no way rhetorical questions, but ominous questions for a small state such as Israel in its very difficult position. 56
Demography and the dissipation of democracy in Israel
An accompanying feature of the change in the existing demographic balance is a change in the power relations in the political system owing to the principle of representation. The increase in weight of populations with no affinity for democracy and without democratic roots in the decision- making systems in Israel constitutes a form of threat to Israeli democracy. Similarly, the Arab population in Israel has great electoral strength, and it is rising with the rise of its demographic weight. This entails growing pressure for a change in Israel's character, and demands for realization of the Palestinians' national rights in the state. The translation of this strength into measures liable to endanger the existence of the Jewish Zionist state has to be prevented.
This problem did not exist in 1949, when the Arab population in Israel numbered 160,000 people, or in the 1970s, when it numbered half a million. But in 2007 the Arabs of Israel are a demographic mass of some one million and a half, which cannot be disregarded, as it is about one fifth of the population of Israel. If every Arab of Israel (excluding the Arabs of Jerusalem) voted for one Knesset electoral list they would have an electoral potential of twenty-one members of the Israeli parliament. In practice, their electoral power is less, because about half of Arab citizens are too young to vote. In the 2000 elections, and then in the 2003 elections, Arab participation in the poll for the Knesset was low because of an organized boycott; still, here is an electoral force with the capacity to influence what happens in the state. We recall that the Arabs of Israel constituted a 'obstruction block' by means of which the former Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin pushed through the Oslo accords; and in 2000-2004 Arab MKs formed a united faction on a series of issues, mainly national. The leaders of the Palestinian Authority use the electoral strength of the Arabs of Israel for their needs in a manner that should concern every Jew in Israel. Dr. Ahmad Tibi, an Israeli citizen, was adviser to Yasser Arafat. The bloody events on the roads of Wadi Ara, in the Negev, and in Galilee in September-October 2000 unfolded through coordination between the Islamic movement in Israel and the actions of 57 the al-Aqsa intifada initiated by Arafat. Thirteen Arab demonstrators were killed in the bloodshed, and this escalated to a serious charge against the Israel police and the establishment; but very little has been said on what happened in those fateful hours of near-insurgency by the Arabs of Israel. It may be said that the Arab sector in Israel succeeded in changing itself from the accused to the accuser.
Because of the normal division of the Knesset into left, right, and centre, the Arabs of Israel could tip the balance in political decisions on national and security matters, for example, the future of the Golan Heights or the future of Jerusalem, should such decisions be put to a referendum or made an election platform. In a few years' time they may very well be able to decide if Israel is to continue to be a Jewish Zionist state or is to become a 'state for all its citizens' (see 'Future Vision of the Palestinians in Israel' and similar documents). Likewise, representatives of the Arabs of Israel in the Knesset have a declared interest in expanding welfare policy (child allowances, guaranteed income, etc.). This interest is common to the Arab parties and the religious parties, and they have manipulated it with dexterity over the years, even if it is clear to any sensible person that this is a catastrophic policy for Israeli society as a whole.
According to the forecast, in 2020 the Arabs of Israel will constitute about 25% of the population, and their electoral strength could yield them thirty MKs. The proportion of all the non-Zionist groups (Arabs and haredim) in 2020 will balloon to 50% of the population of Israel (Table 2)! In recent years the Israeli Jewish public has become more aware of the problems and the complexity of the growing influence of Arab electoral strength. In 2007, for example, 78% of the Jewish public objected to a situation in which the Arab parties would join a coalition and the government, as against 54% in 2000 (Arian, Atmor, and Hadar 2007). At issue here is not an anti- democratic stance of the Jewish public in Israel but increasing awareness of the dangers inherent in the political and social demands of the Arabs of Israel. The central question raised by this is whether Israel will succeed in defending itself in the future against these dangers without harming the 58 principles of a Jewish and democratic state. The answer is not unequivocal owing to the many structural weaknesses of Israeli society and the political system, which greatly impede acting according to model of self-defensive democracy.
The deep schisms in Israeli society – political schisms between rights and left; social schisms, between Ashkenazim and Mizrahim (Jews of eastern origin) and between veterans and new immigrants; religious schisms, among Ashkenazi and Sepharadi haredim, national-religious and traditional, reform, and other Jews; national schisms, between Jews, Arabs, and others: all threaten to disintegrate democracy, along with its judicial, legislative, and executive instruments. With the deepening of these schisms the relative weight of different groups in the Knesset is changing, and the weight of poor groups with high natural increase (Arabs, haredim, and voters for the Shas party, who are a combination of haredim and people from the periphery) is growing. This representation is problematic: never has the Israeli parliamentary body been of such inferior quality as it is in the present decade in so many ways, including regard for existential strategic problems, dealing with long-term national issues, and loyalty to political platforms. To this must be added the moral aspect, as reflected in the proceedings of the parliamentary Ethics committee and in many other cases.
This situation impacts on the Knesset and the executive arm: elections are held every two years instead of every four; minister are replaced at great frequency and it is hard to plan long-term policy vital for a modern society; decisions are made and resources are distributed according to transitory pressures, and no statesman-like approach is evident to long-term problems such as infrastructure, population distribution, water, highways, and security. About this it is said, Israel runs, but it is not run!
This state of affairs yields very serious outcomes in the domains of security, infrastructures, and education. Several systems even now are in a state of collapse (water, electricity, national planning, law enforcement, education) and others are on the way there. The lacunae left are filled by groups that 59 slowly but surely are bringing about the extinction of Israeli democracy. Swift demographic changes and growth of populations devoid of a democratic tradition are endangering the future of Israel as a Jewish democratic and progressive state in the Western sense. With the years, this process is liable to weaken the Israeli political system still more than at present, and to cause its erosion from within, until its capabilities and aspirations are similar to political systems in third world states. Evidence exists that Israel already in this decade is in the third world in many areas (Bystrov 2007).
Demography and the deterioration of the education system
An account of the demographic changes in Israel cannot be complete without a discussion of the country's education system. This is the only system that can provide an efficient solution in the long term to social problems in Israel, as it is a system that imparts norms. But in the present decade the education system appears not set to meet the challenge: it is weak, and has no clear policy on the matter. Instead of striding forwards it seems to be in retreat.
In the 1989-1999 decade the education system absorbed an additional quarter of a million pupils (CBS 1999)! This increase stemmed from the immigration of 750,000 Jews in those years, and from the steep rise in the number of Arab and haredi children. It is hard to offer a solution with such orders of magnitude of children in a decade, without serious bottlenecks being created in teacher training, building of educational institutions, preparing suitable study materials for the wide range of language, cultural, and other groups and subgroups, and in other areas. In 1990-1999 the number of teaching posts rose from 84,301 to 125,358 (CBS 2000), that is, an addition of 41,000 posts, or 30% of the teaching force. In such circumstances teaching quality was bound to be harmed. A no less serious problem is the shortage of professional teams on the higher education levels (a problem rife in all governmental systems where experienced civil servants are thrown out and mediocre politicos are appointed directors). A state that pays the standard- bearers of education in Israel a waiter's wage, without tips, should not 60 expect any achievements in education. Add to this the scandal of granting academic degrees to teachers by dubious means from invisible academic institutions abroad. The Ministry of Education, which awarded graduates of those places bonuses in salary, thereby itself encouraged shallowness and plastering over. This problem indeed erupted and sparked a public storm in 2001, and actually resulted in the withdrawal of recognition of the certificate recipients.
So the decay of the educational system is indeed evident in the fall in quality of studies, in low matriculation scores, principally in regions of the periphery, in the burgeoning of knifing and violence at schools, and in great ignorance, among other subjects in knowledge of Israel's land and the history of Zionism. By 2007 a whole generation of children and youth had grown up who had become soldiers and who had not once visited Jerusalem, Galilee or the Negev. Different populations in the country feel the need to give their children private supplementary education (the well established populations and FSU immigrants) which will equip them with the skills, norms, and knowledge that the regular education system does not supply. A school called Shevah Mofet (a Hebrew play on words: literally, 'praise of the ideal', but here mofet is the acronym of the Hebrew for Mathematics, Physics, and Culture) in Tel Aviv, for example, which is identified with the community of FSU immigrants, declares that it plucks pupils out of the Israeli educational routine, which the immigrants see as sunk in lethargy, indiscipline, and non-encouragement of academic excellence (www.shevahmofet.org).
The Ministry of Education is unable to preserve and nurture a uniform education system on the proper level, but maintains a system that drives away pupils with ambition and means. But this is not the only problem. Pressures from various groups in society and the miserable performance of the decision makers have rendered the Ministry unable to require all pupils in the country to study the core programme that will bestow on them democratic and Western norms! This will have manifold implications for the future character of Israel in all domains – economic, social, cultural, national-political, and security. 61
Here are the words of the educationalist Dr. Zvi Zameret spoken at the Herzliya conference on 18 December 2001, and which are apt for the conditions of 2007 too:
Today, almost half the first-grade children in Israel learn either in the haredi Jewish education system or in the Arab education system. If the present demographic trends continue, it will not be long before two thirds of the children of the state will be educated in non-Zionist institutions… A special problematic prevails in the teachers' training colleges. The average level of students in these colleges, which will determine the face of education and teaching in the coming generation, is unsatisfactory… The following rifts harm our unity and are demolishing education in Israel: between rich and poor; between Jews and Arabs; between the secular, the religious, and the haredim; between veterans and immigrants; between the centre and the periphery; between citizens of the state and foreigners; and between the Jewish communities. All these rifts, apart from the last, have deepened greatly in recent years. The policy of separation in the education system weakens social solidarity in Israel and threatens our entire 'togetherness'.
Not only do the two populations, Arabs and haredim, not receive the Jewish- Zionist narrative, they also lead a way of life that does not accord with the Western lifestyle; and those who fund all this are taxpaying citizens, because in the major working age group – 25-54 – about three quarters of haredi men, and a similar proportion of Arab women, do not join the workforce. In a few years it will not be possible to change the existing situation by the means at the disposal of the Knesset because of the powerful lobby that will support the continuation of this state of affairs (Ben-David 2007). It is reasonable to suppose that these populations, being poor and with many children, and maintaining a traditional attitude to women, will even discover (and already have discovered) much they share in regard to their political and social interests. If the dominant narratives in Israel in 2020 are the Palestinian-Arab narrative and the haredi-Jewish narrative, which of the majority groups today will want to belong to Israeli society?
Collapse of the national planning and the national infrastructures
Rapid demographic growth is leading to severe ecological deterioration 62 throughout Palestine. The decline is advancing at a dizzying pace because of the unique combination of two conflicting trends: population growth rates typical of the third world against demands for land at rates typical of the Western world, where the living standard is rising; and all this in the setting of characteristics of the Israeli planning system. The result is Israel's nearing the limit of its carrying capacity, an effect especially salient on the coastal plain, whose hub is Tel Aviv, the area in which most of the population is concentrated.
Proximity to the carrying-capacity limit causes collapse of the water regime, the transport system, garbage disposal, sewage treatment, and non-prevention of flooding in the major cities, destruction of the sea shore, disappearance of the sand dunes, destruction of agriculture, disappearance of open spaces, collapse of the physical planning system on the national and municipal levels, non-enforcement of the law, deterioration in relations between people, and yawning social gulfs between the Tel Aviv population and the populations of country's centre and periphery.
In the last decade and a half Israel absorbed about a million new immigrants. In a short time-span it was necessary to furnish them with housing solutions, employment, and supporting infrastructures. In such conditions it is difficult to conduct a proper course of planning, taking into account preservation of national assets such as open and agricultural lands, and it is hard to enforce building laws. It is ten times harder when the Knesset is weak and easily succumbs to various pressure groups. In each and every concern we discover that the massive population growth in Israel has caused the collapse of the national planning systems, regional and local: the water regime has collapsed, and agriculture – a cultural, social, security, and also economic asset, in that order of importance and not as the economists would have it – has been savagely smashed. The coastal plain has been built up at the expense of green spaces, and the real-estate culture is celebrating. Illegal construction is evident everywhere, even in entire sectors, and ugly towns mar the landscape in every direction. City centres are continuously decaying and becoming inhabited by a poor population (Arab, haredi, 63 foreign workers, and new immigrants). The lovely Israel of 'then' is growing hideous, and the 'strong' within it are closing themselves off in their neighbourhoods and 'taking trips' abroad for rest and recreation.
The Planning Administration of the Ministry of the Interior, which is supposed to initiate, plan, locate, and direct national projects in the domains of industry, transport, protection of green assets, and population dispersal, is content to try to preserve the existing situation, and surrenders again and again to short-sighted real-estate forces. National planning, expressed in NMP (national master-plan) 31 and in NMP 35, focused on the coastal plain, mainly Tel Aviv: this actually struck a blow at Zionism and was guilty of criminal neglect of the periphery, as it plastered over the matter with empty talk (see the language of NMP 35 with all its frills).
The planning chaos in which Israel finds itself up to the time of writing of this document has caused, and is causing heavy damage, some of it irreversible: the policy of population dispersal has ground to a halt, the transport systems, despite Route 6 and the partial revival of the railway, cannot bear the load, the Arab space is a ruination in terms of municipal planning, and on the coastal plain suburbs have been developed on the model of community settlements, and commerce and industry parks at the expense of agricultural land and open spaces; these exacerbate the collapse of transport and the destruction of the big city centres, a situation pregnant with ecological and social disaster.
The non-defined and non-organized national planning policy that is in place today has brought about a chronic shortage in investment in national infrastructures, which are vitally important for public transport (mainly rail), water purification, and more. The government, which is responsible for initiatives in this area, is opening gaps that will be very hard to close. In 2007 more than eleven million people were living in western Palestine. In the next thirteen years an addition of 5.5 million is expected, so that about fifteen and a half million people will live here. All will need air, good water to drink, and energy to operate all the modern machines. All the adults 64 will make every effort to keep a car and everyone will want to drive in it quickly to their destination – but they won't get there if it is impossible to move them. Such a large population as this will undoubtedly produce very large quantities of garbage and sewage. What about quality of life in the country then?
The outlook is grim, and it concerns all western Palestine, because we share the same destiny as the Palestinians in a large measure of the scant resources of this land: water, air, sea, sewage, parks, transport, power stations, and construction. Without serious attention to the ecological problems Israel will very soon become a third world state. This has direct bearing on the robustness of society in Israel, and on its national security!
The leadership must absorb and grasp the enormity of the demographic problem before it, and its implications. It must gather its wits, and begin urgently to prepare for the year 2020 by complete reversal of the orders of priority in Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Some of the urgently necessary actions are a return to the policy of population dispersal, whose mission is 'occupation' of the northern Negev and the Jordan valley; the rescue of Jerusalem from demographic, social, economic, and ecological decay; building infrastructures suited to a population of some fifteen million expected in 2020; and unremitting concern for law enforcement. In conditions of the expected population density, law enforcement is of supreme importance in maintaining quality of life. Israel's tragedy is that in face of this bleak outlook stands a leadership concerned only for the next twenty-four hours, or at most the next six months, while the solutions required necessitate vision for ten and twenty years hence! In this reality, the disintegration of Israel is inevitable. A leader who reads these words and does not come to his or her senses and embark on real action falls within the definition of criminal! We shall substantiate our statements with two examples: the water regime and the transport system in Israel.
The case of the water regime
Most of Israel's water courses have turned into sewage canals or have dried 65 up. The quality of the water in the aquifers has declined, and the demand for water is rising. Lake Kinneret too (in winter 2007) is at an unprecedented low level. This is the inevitable result of several factors: drought conditions and fear of climate change that will worsen the shortfall, increase in demand for water in Israel and the Palestinian Authority (owing to population increase and rise in living standard), and commitment to supply 55 million m3 of water (about a third of a metre of the Kinneret level) to the kingdom of Jordan. The shockingly low level of the Kinneret led to the determination of a new red line, one metre lower than the earlier red line (214 m instead of 213 m below sea level). The damage is not only aesthetic: the low level entails danger of a deterioration in the quality of the Kinneret water, which supplies about a third of Israel's annual water consumption and also discharges into the Jordan river. If a peace agreement is signed with Syria and Lebanon they too will receive a fraction of the Kinneret water – in fact, Lebanon has already been getting it without any agreement since the end of 2002. The ecological harm to the Kinneret water will have implications for the water regime of Israel and of its neighbours as well (see Table 7).
If Israel had a long-term water policy the collapse of the water regime could
Table 7: Population close to the borders of Israel 2003-2020 and forecast of demands for water Arab population Arab population Volume of water drawn Population adjacent to up to 50 km from from Israeli water potential on Israel's Israel's border Israel's border for the Arab population border with: (millions) (millions) (millions of m3) 2003 2020 2003 2020 2002 2020 Lebanon 0.2 0.5 1.0 2.0 15 30 Syria 0.1 0.2 6.0 12.0 - - (220-300*) Jordan 0.3 0.5 4.5 8.0 55 150 Palestinians 3.3 6.2 3.3 6.2 270 400 Egypt 0.02 0.1 0.2 3.4 - - Total 4.0 7.5 15.0 30.0 340 ~830 Source: Soffer 2004. * In the case of Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights. 66 be prevented by saving water in agriculture and through desalination on a larger scale than at present, and in other ways. To our great misfortune, the water regime reflects the governmental impotence we described above. The water shortage is expressed in the rising prices of water for domestic and agricultural consumption. According to the programmes of the government's Water and Sewage Authority, which was established on 1 January 2007, by the beginning of the next decade desalinated water production will reach about 275 m3 annually (see Table 8). This volume is supposed to increase by 25% the supply of sweet water in Israel. Will the projected amount of desalinated water indeed be available, and will the water supply keep pace with the future demands? The master-plan for the water regime in Israel published in 2002 spoke of desalination of 365 m3 of seawater, in addition to the purification of 100 m3 from problematic wells and of brackish water. Then there was also talk of importing water and recycling sewage water. This programme has to be implemented at once, before disaster strikes!
All we have stated regarding the water regime applies to the electricity regime. Must we wait for a shortage in Israel, and for electricity blackouts, for the most vital system in the modern state to stir?
The case of the transport regime
The collapsing transport regime is perhaps the worst case of disintegration, because it exacts a high price in individuals' lives, in the economy, and in quality of life. The number of fatalities in road accidents in Israel since the
Table 8: Desalination plants in Israel (operational) Location of Implementation Annual water Outlook for start facility stage volume (million m3) of supplying water Ashkelon Supplies water 100 August 2005 Palmahim Running in 30 June 2007 Hadera Planning 100 End of 2009 Ashdod Applicability study 45 2012 Source: According to data of the Water Authority 2007. 67 founding of the state is equal to that of Israel's war dead from 1882 (the founding of Rishon Le-tsiyon) to the present day. Every year between 400 and 500 people are killed, a number close that of the soldiers killed in the three years of the first Lebanon war. Every decade the number of vehicles in the state increases by 100%. The highway infrastructure, by contrast, improves only by 10-16% every ten years. Road traffic, especially in the big cities in the centre, is already now more or less gridlocked. What will happen in 2010 or 2020, when the population will have doubled, and alongside it the fleet of vehicles? Apart from the heavy price exacted by the flawed transport system from the public in the dead, the injured, damage to property, and incalculable time lost, we pay for the deterioration in driving culture. Every day on the roads we encounter manifestations of running red lights, wild driving on the lines of 'One driver is a wolf to another', and the slaughter of entire families. Constantly we hear of knifings over parking space or a pedestrian crossing. Nothing so much as the collapse of the transport system can plunge Israel into the very heart of the third world.
The driving culture that has developed here is one of the expressions of the grim situation of dense crowding in Israeli society. Population density in face of the aspiration for a high Western quality of life, in conditions of a semi- arid climate and ongoing tension over security, strikes at relations between person and person, and brings violence to the society on all its levels – even at the elementary school. And in this matter too the demographic forecast does not bode well.
In the two cases intended to illustrate the collapse of the planning system, as in other areas of physical infrastructure, the tragedy of over-privatization finds expression. The government does not contend with the market failures, in that it has stopped budgeting for national enterprises meant to serve the public as a whole. By contrast, the private initiatives of the tycoons (undertaken only for their own benefit) dictate the national agenda in the state and determine where and of what scope to build, to purify water, to pave roads, and to advance. This is a catastrophic process, and it has to be stopped! Part Three
What Can Still be Done to Save Israel? 69
In this document we have indicated a long list of threats to Israel at varying pace. All of them have to be solved, but some call for immediate resolution. Almost all of them spring from Israel's geographic location in the violent and extremist Middle East. All are associated with demography, that is, to the high natural increase of the different populations, which are becoming increasingly impoverished hence increasingly violent. Among other things we have noted the ever dwindling Jewish majority in Palestine; the periphery, including Jerusalem, being abandoned by the Jews; the haredim and the Arabs who are multiplying and suck the marrow from the bones of the shrinking middle class; and the lack of action on the part of the state planning system on each and every level to prevent the crumbling of the infrastructures that support these populations. We have drawn attention to the third world symptoms evident in Israel in every matter and concern; the unending Arab-Israel conflict, which will continue for decades more; immigration, now showing signs of halting, and the swelling departure of the best of the land; the draining of national vigour and belief in the Israel Defence Forces; the worsening of relations of Jews and Arabs inside Israel; the awful social situation; the intolerable gulfs between rich and poor; the low and still dropping education level; the growth of a state within a state to the point of the one threatening the other – 'Tel Aviv state' – which threatens Israel's existence; the dearth of a value-laden and cultivated political leadership; the shocking political and geopolitical reality.
Yehezkel Dror (Dror 2007) also writes of Israel as a Middle Eastern state with glaring features of the third world, characterized by the cessation of immigration and the dropping out of strong elites. These factors contribute to a demographic balance not in favour of the Jews, a low cultural level, a wretched social situation expressed among other things in deep chasms between groups, crowding of the Jewish population into the Dan bloc, a serious leadership crisis, and more. But Dror envisages this as 'a real nightmare for Israel by the year 2030'. By contrast, he calls the optimistic scenario for Israel's future 'a real vision for Israel by 2030'. To our great misfortune, this is a scenario that is not anchored to reality in a single one of its parts, and it is doubtful that it will be realized even if positive developments were to occur in all the major arenas. 70
In view of all this, recall that the area of western Palestine is smaller that that of countries with populations of similar size. About 60% of its area is desert or semi-arid, on which it is difficult to establish settlements, mainly because of the lack of water sources. About 42% of Israel's land area is military and security zones. Most of them are in the desert regions, but they also lie on the Golan Heights, along the country's coast, in areas commanding mountain summits, and on the plains (where are located large airfields and military bases). The result is that the country north of Beersheba is one of the most crowded regions on earth. Such a country will be hard pressed to absorb hundreds of thousands of immigrants without adversely affecting the quality of life. The small amount of free space has to be reserved for Jewish immigrants who want to reach the Promised Land.
Many of the planners liken Israel to Holland ('The devil is not so terrible'). True, Holland is as crowded as Israel (in 2007), but natural increase there is close to zero, the country is not desert or semi-desert, and its neighbours – Germany, Belgium, and Luxembourg – are akin to it in their Western orientation, their Christian religion, and their per capita income; and all are joined with it in a common economic union. Since the Second World War Holland has had no reason to fear its neighbours' territorial ambitions, so it does not need an army of IDF dimensions.
Israel's situation is entirely different. Natural increase is among the highest in the world, and between it and its neighbours – Syria, Jordan, and Egypt, and also Iraq and the rest of the Arab world – great economic, religious, social and national divides prevail. Most of the society living inside the borders of Israel is advanced and Western, and able to find an answer to the shortages in water, territory, and employment; but the society that lives in the remaining regions of Palestine is incapable of solving its problems, especially in face of its enormous natural increase. Experience from other places in the world with such gaps teaches that in such conditions the poor population begins to stream towards the boundaries of the richer region. In our case, apart from the gaps we have described, the circumstances facilitate such a stream: an Israeli Palestinian population that identifies with its sister 71 in the east, an Israeli demand for cheap labour, and the Palestinians' desire to realize the demand for return and family unification. If that were not enough, all the believers in Greater Israel refuse to recognize Israel's life- fence and wish to bring it down. In this situation Israel is liable to be flooded with millions of Arabs, and that will certainly mean its turning into a third world state.
How is Israel to be saved? We hesitate to write a chapter of 'advice' because we can hardly believe that the present government, or the one that will follow, will show enterprise, will act, will diverge from the daily routine, and will bring about striking change through corrective action; Israeli democracy in its present form seems unable to provide an answer to the many challenges we have indicated. Nevertheless, a way of action has to be sought – while preserving the principles of democracy and breaking through the barriers of bureaucratic and legal sluggishness. It is unthinkable that in the most densely packed country in the Western world, whose density will increase still more with the laying of every new kilometer of road and railway track, with every water pipeline put in place and with every water purification facility constructed, that the raising of the separation fence – Israel’s life fence – will cease because of a series of pending Supreme Court hearings that delay its construction, or through surrender to the pressures of interest groups that torpedo every positive and necessary move.
The legal wrangling and the accompanying delays (some of which are due to over-employment of lawyers and inefficiency in the public sector) have to be reduced. The 'Treasury boys', a group of youngsters who got their training in the economics departments of academic institutions and who are ignorant of geo-politics, must not be allowed to determine the order of priorities in the state. They may assist, but may not be given the right to veto decisions of supreme national importance. Similarly, the rampaging of the super-rich who in fact run 'Tel Aviv state', as they totally ignore the State of Israel, must be stopped. The haredim, who are only 8% of the population, have to be put in their proper place, and not permitted to gnaw away the pillars of the Zionist state. The concepts in Israeli politics 72 of 'national interest' and 'national order of priorities' must be restored to the lexicon, not as an alternative to democratic arrangements but out of the need to advance vital action despite, and in face of, marginal interests (without belittling the importance of human rights and the like).
• In view of the chilling picture we have described, in the first place Jerusalem, Israel's capital, has to be saved. This requires the transfer of all government departments to the capital, and at once. Government departments that still are located in Tel Aviv, on flimsy pretexts, including the General Staff, the Ministry of Defence, and the other security arms (the Military Colleges campus, Army Radio, IDF Spokesperson) will be removed forthwith from 'Tel Aviv state'. When last did the United States president deliver an official speech not from Washington DC? But in Israel the speech so fateful for the nation was spoken in Herzliya, not in the International Convention Centre (Binyanei Ha'uma) or the Knesset in Jerusalem. With just this brief list of institutions we have 'restored' to Jerusalem several thousand employees. Some of them will move there to live, and some will pay the price of nerve-wracking journeys on Israel's highways. After them, the Tel Aviv media too will be forced to go up to Jerusalem every day.
• A wedge of Jewish settlements intervening between the Gaza Strip and the Bedouins in the south is vitally important; therefore the Ashkelon- Sderot-Netivot-Ofakim-Beersheba settlement continuum must be seen as a strategic axis for development. If Beersheba reaches half a million residents the problem of the Bedouins in the northern Negev will be solved of itself, by their integration into Israeli society. How are half a million Jews to be brought to Beersheba? A 'bullet' train on the Beersheba–Kiryat Gat–Tel Aviv line will approximate the Negev capital to the core. This is the situation in Japan and France, and these are democratic solutions that can be implemented.
• Population dispersal must include the north too, for the benefit of Jews and Arabs alike, and among other things thickening around Jenin, 73
Wadi Ara, and the 'Kokhav' settlements on the northern and southern coastal plain.
• Sealing the Israel-Egypt and Israel-Jordan borders will stop the influx of war materiel and illegal substances from these states into Israel, will force the northern Negev Bedouins to seek alternative means of livelihood and cease serving as a deadly bridge between the Arab states and the Gaza Strip, and thence to Judea and Samaria, and will return to the Negev to the bosom of sovereign Israel.
• The government of Israel must also implement projects long discussed: dismantling the complex of military training bases in the centre of Israel has been on the national agenda since 1957. The IDF must continue to be moved south, but the land that is evacuated has to be earmarked for green parks, not giant residential quarters. Stopping the wild real-estate party will work to the benefit of the small citizen, who truly bears the burden of maintaining the state. Preserving Israel as a state of the first world is possible through high quality high-rise building, by enforcing the law in all its weight in all spheres – driving, public cleanliness, legal building, taxpaying – by means of infrastructure operations on a scale unknown in the past, and raising education to a high place in the order of priorities. The yardstick for salary must weight an individual's contribution to society, to the state, and to its future: the teacher certainly stands above every other profession and must be rewarded accordingly. A society that pays a teacher the same as waiter but without a tip may not be considered an upright state or a state of the first world. Whoever made possible this shocking state of affairs in the area of education comes under the definition of criminal!
• Singapore, Holland, and New York are examples of crowded places in which life can be reasonable, civilized, and possible. This can happen only when law and a clear-cut order of priorities, transparent to all in the state, exist, and not anarchy. An effective democratic regime cannot be preserved without law enforcement and the safeguard of public order. 74
Without these elements Israeli democracy will continue to fade and lose public trust, on the way to its total extinction. Therefore, the strength of the police has to be tripled right now: there is sufficient workforce in the Arab and haredi sector. Great numbers of them can serve in the police as part of their national service for the good of the entire community. In any event, law enforcement will relieve the tensions between Jews and Arabs, and will bring enormous improvement to the municipal system in the Arab sector. In saying this, we imply that many of the government failures are connected to the failures of the judicial system in Israel.
If Israel becomes a good land, Jews will come here despite the overcrowding, and the strong ones will wish to remain here. This calls for infrastructure solutions, and long-term national planning. At present the Jews of France prefer Montreal, the Jews of South Africa have preferred Australia, and millions of Jews from Russia and elsewhere prefer New York, to say nothing of some of the Israelis themselves.
The issue of relations between Israel and its neighbours, particularly relations with the Palestinian people, does not depend only in Israel. We are not wanted here. Israel must define its permanent borders, unilaterally and out of concern for its future as a Jewish and Zionist state in defensible borders. Separation fences in Judea and Samaria and the Gaza Strip have proved their efficiency against the penetration of suicide bombers and the permeation of Palestinians into Israel, and have reduced some of the crime. We shall have to find solutions for other challenges such as curved- trajectory firing and tunnels. Some of these will not sound sweet to those who forever show concern for the rights of the other man (in London, Paris, Brussels and other capitals of the West).
To sum up, an engaged society with the workforce found in Israel can provide answers to all the problems we have raised. To that end, responsible leaders and clear national order of priorities are needed. Most of the Jews of Israel are not prepared to commit suicide, and most of them do not have passports of the USA, Romania, Russia, and Estonia – and they will stay here. 75
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Appendix: The Bedouins in the northern Negev: Geographic aspects 2007 Arnon Soffer
General background
According to records of the Central Bureau of Statistics, at the beginning of 2007 about 240,000 Bedouins lived in Israel. This figure has to be augmented by an estimated 20,000-40,000 people who are not registered legally, owing to unreported purchase of wives from Gaza, southern Mt. Hebron, and Jerusalem, or the southern Kingdom of Jordan. One estimate gives a figure of 14,000 wives who were bought by the Bedouins of the Negev since 1967. The Bedouin terrains of the Negev were also entered by fellahs from Mt. Hebron as illegal inhabitants. Their precise number is hard to gauge.
In 1949 the Bedouins in the south numbered 13,000 people, and in the north of Israel about 6,500. Previously the Bedouin population in the south had been 80,000. During Israel's War of Independence some of them moved to Sinai and southern Jordan, and a few to Mt. Hebron. This population, mainly in the south, was exceptional in its natural increase being among the highest in the world, for several reasons: in the Negev, more than in the north, the custom of one man buying many wives was prevalent; and Israel's welfare policy encouraged bringing children into the world as a profitable 'business'. This feature is an offshoot of political deals between governments and the haredi parties, which demanded subsidies for their children. But the haredi male has only one wife, while the Bedouin has many, and the outcome has not been slow in coming: in matters of childbirth the Bedouin population behave as if in a third world state, but this group in fact belonges to a state of the developed world, with efficient and sound health systems. Therefore, mortality among the Bedouins is like that of the Jews, and even lower, for most of that population are children and youth.
This combination of factors caused the annual natural increase in the south 81 of Israel to reach 5-5.5% (a fall in the natural increase rate was observed in 2003-2007). Such a high natural increase means a doubling of the Bedouin population in the south every twelve to fifteen years. This is a phenomenon whose implications for Bedouin and Israeli society are immense (Elbaz and Hogeg 2007). Table 1 shows the growth of the Bedouin population in Israel between 1945 and 2007 in the two main groups: in the south and in the north.
Geo-demographic aspects
Records of the Central Bureau of Statistics show that in 2007 the Bedouin of the south of Israel numbered 164,330 people. To these should be added wives bought outside Israel's borders and many offspring still not legally registered as citizens of Israel, as well as villagers mainly from Mt. Hebron who moved to live among the Bedouin in the south; in all, this is an addition of up to 30,000 people (estimated data). According figures of the Ministry of the Interior (2006) 7,100 people in the Bedouin south were registered as applying for Israeli citizenship, apparently wives from the territories purchased by residents of the south, who craved an Israeli identity card.
The Bedouin population may be counted in several ways. One is according to age breakdown, a method that reveals a unique feature on a worldwide
Table 1: Growth of the Bedouin population in the south (1945-2006) Year Dispersal Permanent settlements Total 1945/6 80-60,000 80-60,000 1951 13,000 13,000 1960 17,800 17,800 1969 25,320 A few dozen families only 1980 30,700 6,300 37,000 1989 46,100 40,376 86,476 2000 52,171 67,564 119,127 2006 60,839 103,491 164,330 Sources: Elbaz and Hogeg 2007, according to Ministry of Interior data. For 1945: Stendahl 1992, Negev Statistical Yearbook 2000. 82 scale, and has very important implications for what happens in this sector at present and in the coming years. Obviously, there is room to examine their geographic spread throughout the Negev; it can be according to tribal distribution, namely which Bedouin are pure and which are tribes of fellahs (Egyptians); or according to breakdown of residents of the permanent settlements as against residents of the scattered settlements (hereinafter 'the scatter'); and within the permanents settlement according to a distinction between townspeople and rural people in regional council jurisdictions. Each of these distinctions raises a range of issues – municipal, concerned with welfare, but also concerned with security.
Issues of high natural increase
Natural increase among the Bedouin of the south is, as stated, among the highest in the world (if not the highest) (Table 2). We add to the factors enumerated above one more, indeed characteristic of nomads. The nomadic culture shows greatly interest in enlarging the family or the tribe so as to strengthen it against other tribes. In times of emergency and drought only the strong will survive in the struggle for living space.
Family size also bestows prestige and status; in the present case the purchase of wives relatively cheaply in Judea and Samaria, the Gaza Strip, and Jordan
Table 2: Natural increase among Bedouin in the south (2000-2006) Number of Year Population Birth rate* Comments children 2000 125,773 6,826 54.2 2001 132,530 6,955 52.5 2002 137,986 7,174 51.9 2003 145,280 7,544 51.9 Record number of births 2004 151,421 7,172 47.3 Start of downward trend 2005 158,091 6,986 44.2 Continuation of downward trend 2006 164,330 6,949 42.2 Continuation of downward trend Source: Ministry of Health, southern district 2007 * Mortality rates in the Bedouin sector are like those in the rest of the Arab sector in Israel, at about 2.5 per thousand 83 facilitates the aggrandizement of this asset. This has been augmented by economic considerations, as the allowances granted by the State of Israel for a large number of children are extremely high, and have encouraged many Bedouin quite simply to 'produce' children, pure and simple, as a source of income (Table 3). Evidence supporting this argument is found in processes in the Bedouin sector since the allowances were drastically reduced in November 2002, a move that caused a demographic upheaval among the Bedouin (Tables 2-3). Mortality among the Bedouin in Israel is low thanks to the advanced health services in the state as a whole.
Table 3: Reduction of allowances for families with many children (from 1 July 2002) (in NIS) 5 10 15 20 25 30 Date children children children children children children Allowances before 2,266 6,606 10,946 15,286 19,626 23,966 reduction (in NIS) Allowances after 1,132 2,777 4,422 6,067 7,712 9,357 reduction (in NIS) Loss of income 1,134 3,829 6,524 9,219 11,914 14,609 Source: According to Elbaz and Hogeg 2007.
The large number of children of the Bedouin harms the Bedouins themselves as well as society in Israel as a whole. At the start of the 21st century it is impossible to bring children up to meet the challenges of the future when one father has tens of offspring. A sample field survey conducted by the Ministry of the Interior in 2006 in one of the tribes in the south found 2,626 children under the age of 18 in 225 families, that is, 11.6 children on average per household. A more detailed examination discovered two families with more than 30 children to one father, and one family with 43 children; 21 families with 20-30 children to one father, and 112 families with 10-20 children to one father; these amounted to about 50% of the total population of households in that tribe. Ninety families were counted with 1-9 children to one father, some of them young couples.
The proportion of southern Bedouin families consisting of one man with 84 two wives or more is estimated at about 35%. Various data show that hundreds of men have married four wives or more in the course of their lifetime. However, this feature is slowly declining, and in 2007 most men had two to three wives.
The offspring of these fathers grow up in a dysfunctional home, without decent sanitation, electricity, health and education services, or training for an occupation, not to mention the attention that every child needs. This is an explosive situation, for both the Bedouin and the state, and for its other citizens.
The high natural increase over so many years has created among the southern Bedouin population a warped age pyramid: 60.5% of the total population are children and youth (Ministry of the Interior 2006). The significance of this is that the demographic momentum will continue to affect the growth rates of the Bedouin of the south for at least the coming three decades, despite the fall in the Bedouin woman's fertility, which indeed is happening. In other words, the Bedouin population will continue to enlarge in the years ahead, and according to various forecasts it will amount to about a quarter of the entire population of the Arabs of Israel (at present they are 15%) with about 300,000 people in 2020 and about 400,000 in 2030.
In 1990, in the Beersheba region the Bedouins were 31% of the entire population; by 2006 this had risen to 45.3%, and by 2020 they will have formed a majority in the northern Negev (CBS 2006). This rapid population growth has implications for any slight chance of an economic and educational breakthrough in this society, for going by the distress in other societies in the country it is extremely doubtful if in the next decade Israel will invest all its resources in that one alone. Clearly, these processes will have geo- demographic and geo-strategic effects.
Geographic spread
At the end of Israel's War of Independence the Bedouin from the south of the country were assembled in a region known as the 'reserved zone'. But their 85 natural increase on the one hand, and the feeble display of sovereignty by the Israeli government on the other, resulted in the scattering of the Bedouin population far beyond the reserved zone (Map 1).
As the figure shows, in 1951 the picture was wholly different. In 2007, the spread of the Bedouin population de facto is over an area of 240,000 dunams, but including areas taken over for agriculture and more lands presently under litigation the figure is 800,000 dunams. From the overall planning view, the 'seized' area, that is, the area where alternative planning is now
Scatter parallel to the Reserved zone 1951 Beersheba-Kiryat Gat Jurisdiction of a permanent highway Bedouin settlement N Bedouin settlement area 2002-2007 Rahat Highway A few on the Laqiya incline down to the Dead Sea Hawra
Beersheba Tel Sheva Isolated scatterings Kisufiyya westward Segev Shalom Arara in the Negev
Dimona
Concentrations on the 0 2 4 6 way to Mitzpe Ramon km
Map 1: Scattering of Bedouin in the south (in the reserved zone) 1951-2007 86 not possible, amounts to about 1,600,000 dunams (about 1600 km2). In this expanse, by 2006 about 51,000 illegal buildings had been constructed (in the order of 5,000 rigid structures, 25,000 huts and sheds, and a similar number of sheep-pens, cowsheds, and tents). So a dangerous reality has sprung up in national terms, and a future human tragedy for large sections of the southern Bedouin population (Chechashvili 2003; Survey of the Ministry of the Interior Unit for Building Supervision 2002; author's processing of aerial photography 2007).
These issues call for examination from several angles, including efforts to place the Bedouin population in permanent settlements. Considering the educational and economic failure of this sector, the scattering described above and the attempts at reasonable physical or social planning carry national significance for a population increasing at 5-6% annually owing to natural increase and migration to the area from the outside.
Concentration of the Bedouin population in permanent settlements
In the first years following the creation of the state, the Israeli establishment was laggard in providing a settlement solution for about 13,000 Bedouins. By the mid-1960s this population had grown to 33,000, and then it was decided gradually to move them to permanent settlements. The settlement of Tel Sheva was established in 1968, but the planning of the first houses (35 m2 per family) did not take their physical and cultural needs into consideration. Three years later (1971) Rahat was established, and another group of settlements was formed 25 years later (1996): Hawa, Kissifiya, Laqiya, Arara, and Segev Shalom. The Bedouin population grew fast, and in 1982 it was 42,000. By 1993 the figure had reached 86,500, and in less than 14 years it had doubled; in 2007 it numbered 164,300 people (Ministry of the Interior 2007). The result is that despite the building and brisk inhabitation of the Bedouin towns, among other things through extension of their jurisdiction, the problem of the scatter of unrecognized settlements seems unlikely to be positively resolved (as it has been in the north of Israel). 87
Table 4 shows the inhabiting of the permanent settlements as against the rate of growth of the Bedouin population in the scatter. The percentages seem to indicate some success, but the absolute numbers show that the humanitarian and educational crisis of the dwellers of the scatter remains unchanged: the settlements of the scatter grow constantly larger, and despite the serious consequences expected of this situation they will not be evacuated, apparently for political reasons and fear of international intervention. The media have a role in this too.
Presumably we shall see a process of creeping recognition of these scattered places as permanent settlements, which in the end will perpetuate primitive places, dispersed in a way that does not allow them spatial organization efficient for their residents themselves, and at an intolerable cost in arrangements for their essential services. So we may expect – in the future as in the present – tension in a socio-economic and even national setting between the Bedouins and the Israeli establishment. This mess is bound up with the defects of the establishment – the hesitation of the nation's leaders to take courageous decisions regarding the Bedouins' ferocious struggle for recognition of their ownership of these 800,000 dunams that are at issue, and regarding other problems that do not charm those who seek populism.
Table 4: Permanent settlements and scattered settlements among the southern Bedouin Population Annual Annual Total southern Scattered Year in permanent growth growth Bedouin population Settlements (percent) (percent) Population 1993 40,376 46,100 86,476 1995 44,406 10.60 47,722 2.13 92.128 1997 54,316 6.98 48,244 0.70 102,560 1999 63,299 8.94 51,563 1.52 114,862 2001 73,602 8.94 53,647 1.18 127,249 2003 82,681 4.81 57,722 3.09 140,403 2005 93,141 6.38 58,633 0.97 152,774 2007 103,491 5.11 62,000 2.02 165,491 Source: Ministry of the Interior, according to Elbaz and Hogeg 2007 88
Planning, educational, and other solutions for a population that increases by 5% and more every year will not simply materialize out of thin air!
Nation significance of the geo-demographic reality of the Bedouins in the south
The national agenda has three main problems concerning the issue of the Bedouins of the south. The first is the growth of a population which has not enjoyed proper education for the reasons listed above, which is unable to integrate into the modern Israeli economy (except in unskilled service jobs), and which perhaps is not interested in doing so. The result is embittered citizens in the form of an Israeli-Palestinian mix (created through the marriage of Israeli men to women from the territories and from Jordan) who by nature incline to the Palestinian side in the Israel-Arab conflict and to a return to Islam, which is typical of the Bedouin population generally and of those in the permanent settlements in particular.
A considerable number of Bedouin in the south are involved in trade in war materiel, as middlemen, and in smuggling property and goods, in verbal violence (some influenced by the Islamic Movement) and in fist-fighting, in collecting protection money from the southern towns, in wild driving, in stone-throwing at vehicles on the roads, in disturbances, and in distributing pamphlets against Israel. In their settlements illegal building and squatting on state land has increased (data assembled by the author at the ministries of Justice, Interior, and Police in the Southern district, February 2007). The helplessness of the authorities and the encroaching lawlessness have driven many Jews to abandon the settlements in the south.
In face of this reality, the legislative authority and the executive authority in the south display inaction, expressed not only in the cultural, educational, and social vacuum, but also in the failure to preserve the public infrastructure such as water, electricity, and communication facilities, roads and trains, and security infrastructures of the utmost importance. In recent years more than a third of all acts of sabotage against water installations, and about a half of those against the electricity system, occurred in the south (Chechashvili 2003). 89
The geo-demographic spread in Palestine and in the Bedouin south in particular
The southern Bedouins' spread – towards Mt. Hebron to the north, from the Rahat area westwards to the Gaza Strip and south-westwards to Revivim- Retamim in the direction of the Egyptian border, and to the slopes of the Dead Sea in the east (Map 2) – merges with the broader tendency to create an Arab territorial continuum from Biranit in the north through Galilee, Jezreel valley, Samaria, Jerusalem, Mt. Hebron, and thence through the terrain of the Bedouin spread that stretches to the Gaza Strip and the Egyptian border. This Palestinian continuum is closing in increasingly on 'Tel Aviv state' and gradually turning it – perhaps unnoticed (by the policy makers in Israel) – into a catastrophic trap, if this process continues.
The Bedouin in the south – as an international bridge
The location of the Bedouin in the northern Negev has made them an economic and security bridge between Egypt and the Kingdom of Jordan or Mt. Hebron (i.e., Judea and Samaria). The link between the Gaza Strip and Jordan or Mt. Hebron is also created through the Bedouin expanses in the south and with their close support. Naturally, a firm connection exists between the inhabitants of Mt. Hebron and the Bedouin in the south, and similarly with the Bedouin in the Gaza Strip. This is a family connection that encompasses Israel, Jordan, Egypt, Mt. Hebron, and the Gaza Strip, and translates into trade ties also (mostly illegal).
The result is clear: by virtue of their geographical location and their economic- social-political-religious background, the southern Bedouin are becoming a human and geographical connection for Egypt, Jordan, Mt. Hebron, and the Gaza Strip, and also with the interior of Israel. Among other things, this involves smuggling of drugs, arms, and stolen goods, refugees and women for prostitution, namely trafficking in women. The scope of this smuggling has for long not been just a police matter but has assumed security and even strategic dimensions (Map 2). 90
Jerusalem
ISRAEL
JUDAEA AND SAMARIA GAZA
JORDAN Beersheba
EGYPT
Map 2: Bedouin in the south as an international junction
Summary
In view of the high natural increase among the Bedouins in the south, which has no equal in the world, and the geo-demographic implications of their spread in the southern expanses, it must be asked how the coming cycle of disaster is to be averted. Clearly, this entire issues is dismissed or swept under the national rug, so that the problems grow worse and harder to solve. Below we attempt to analyse what still may be done, and what, presumably, will be done spontaneously, as has happened so far.
Natural increase is already on the decline, and will continue to decline, but demographic momentum will do its work, and the Bedouin population will continue to grow and its relative weight in Arab society in Israel can only increase. This presages worsening clashes between it and the establishment. If the separation fence is extended to Ein Gedi, the number of women imported into Israel will presumably fall, although this import it will not stop altogether. 91
The government will apparently be obliged to recognize most of the Bedouin scattered settlements as permanent settlements; this is not a matter of ten settlements but of a least 40 in the first stage and about 100 in the second stage. These settlements are illegitimate, and there is every reason to fear that their planning will not be proper so Israel will have the Bedouin tragedy in the south as its companion for many years to come.
As for the geo-strategic problems raised in this article, several solutions exist, among them decisive dispersal of the Jewish population throughout the country, but mainly in the south. Similarly, the borders with Egypt and Jordan have to be sealed urgently, and the construction of the fence separating Israel and Mt. Hebron has to be completed. Only these measures will curtail the likelihood of the Bedouin in the south constituting an international bridge (not necessarily in the positive sense).
As regards crime in the south, only law enforcement is required, something that is possible and highly essential, in the Negev as in Tel Aviv and everywhere else in Israel.
It should not be assumed that reasonable solutions will be found for the distress of the Bedouin as long as the child allowances encourage high natural increase. Nevertheless, a decent solution has to be found to advance the economy of the recognized villages, with the right mix of industry combined with farming and grazing. Evgenia Bystrov research associate at the Reuven Chaikin Chair in Geostrategy, University of Haifa, and PhD student at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Prof. Arnon Soffer, a member of the Department of Geography and Environmental Studies, holds the Reuven Chaikin Chair in Geostrategy at the University of Haifa. He also teaches at Israels National Defense College and serves on the board of the Zionist councils strategic forum.