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A One-Sided Assessment of Israel's Bedouin Community

(Times of Israel) Robert Cherry - In a New York Times Sunday review feature, "The Two Israels," Nicholas Kristof presented a one-sided assessment of the situation of the Negev Bedouin community. Hura mayor Mohammed Alnabari provides a different picture. The Bedouin town has gained call center jobs, initiated a Women's Catering Enterprise that produces meals for Bedouin schools, developed a joint project with a nearby kibbutz to produce high value-added produce, and began a project with the Jewish National Fund to raise mixed heads of sheep and goats for organic meat and dairy products. And the government has provided substantial subsidies to firms that hire Bedouin workers in the new industrial park in Rahat and through other employment initiatives. The OECD approved Israeli membership on the basis of substantial improvements in employment initiatives, infrastructure - roads, transportation networks, sewage facilities - and a dramatic improvement in Bedouin schooling that substantially increased student test scores. The share of Arab children in preschool programs has risen from 49% in 2000 to 71% in 2010. While Kristof correctly noted the funding problems towns face, he should not trivialize the sustained efforts being made to rectify this situation. The writer is a professor of economics at Brooklyn College.
2015-03-10 00:00:00
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