Politic?: Arab-on-Arab Violence in Israel

"To only speak about crime in the Arab sector is to not understand all the factors surrounding the issue. There are issues between families, weapons within easy reach."
"The first address [people turn to] is always police, police, police, but that isn’t right [when a key issues is the infrastructure of the Arab towns, particularly in northern Israel]."
"In all the Arab villages the roads are terrible; they are packed full and overcrowded. It is so crowded and difficult, and people are coming and going from every direction.When you live in a place like that... that feels like a slum and looks like a slum [it affects you], and in the Arab sector it is really terrible."
"Many of the youth – they don’t have income, they don’t have a profession [many turn to gangs and organized crime groups, offering opportunities]. They see the groups and ask themselves, What do I want in life? Do I also want that? and they grow close to [the organized crime groups]... they earn salaries, sometimes high ones."
Leah Leshem, Israel Police spokeswoman, Northern District

"We always feel threatened when we enter shooting or stabbing incidents. It is frightening because after every such incident, the police arrive after extreme delays, and we are already inside the scene of the crime."
"About a year ago I arrived at the scene of the murder of a woman at the hands of her partner. We went up to the apartment to treat the woman, who was in critical condition, and the murderer was walking around outside at the entrance to the house. The police arrived very late."
"In my opinion, the eradication of weapons in the Arab sector would significantly lower the level of violence."
"Every morning there is a new murder. The year is not over yet and we have already almost broken a record for crime compared to the previous years."
"It is a huge failure, in my opinion, because we do not see increased activity to eradicate crime. We see the opposite, that the level of crime is rampant at a very high frequency."
Marwan, volunteer EMT, United Hatzalah

Murder scene in Rama where Education Ministry adviser Sahar Ismael was shot dead on Sunday, August 15, 2021. (photo credit: ISRAEL POLICE SPOKESMAN)

Within Israel homicides inside the Arab community has seen a notable upward spiral in recent years. From 58 murders that took place in 2013 in the Arab sector of Israel, 98 have taken place so far in 2021. Of those murders, fewer than a quarter have been solved. And critics claim that this is an issue of police indifference -- along with Arab distrust of the police. That, despite that 700 Arab recruits into the Israeli police force has taken place in recent years.

Of over 3,300 shootings in 2019 that occurred in Arab communities, a mere five percent resulted in indictments. A situation that police say results from difficulties in gathering evidence and locating suspects and witnesses in the same Arab communities that bitterly complain of a lack of police presence. The spike in internecine violence is attributed by Arab leaders and government officials to the rise of armed Arab crime syndicates.

Loan sharking and protection rackets are brutally enforced by unemployed, aimless young Arabs prepared to act as foot soldiers for the earnings involved. That, however, is just part of the story. Personal grudges, land disputes between neighbours, petty slights between schoolchildren, all add to the numbers of crimes committed. Some situations escalate into lethal clan vendettas. Guns are turned against women during domestic violence in "honour killings".

In Jewish communities of similar size and population to those of the Arab communities, there are after-school social gatherings where children can communicate with one another, share common interests, find themselves involved in community events, learn new skills, but no such after-school groups are organized in Arab towns and villages. Some Arab families send their children to attend the Jewish social groups in nearby villages, but generally Arabs tend not to favour their children interacting with Jewish children.

The Arab criminal class is growing, accounting for roughly 70 percent of all homicides in Israel, even as Arabs represent slightly over 20 percent of the total population of the country. The entire country has been shocked by the surging violence, amid the general acknowledgement that government neglect in Arab communities plays a part in the burgeoning crime taking place there. Infrastructure is not the priority in Arab communities by government agencies that it is in Jewish communities.

There is endemic poverty and people live in close proximity, in crowded conditions bordering on the squalid. The crime wave has resulted in Arab leaders pleading for police action. Arab communities are full of illegal weapons, and when disputes take place they readily become lethal. Although the Arab population of Israel is under two million strong, estimates of illegal gun numbers in Arab communities range from tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands.

"Nobody really knows how to quantify it", Tomer Lotan, director-general of the Ministry of Public Security, stated. Mass protests have been organized by Arab politicians, and activists call on government to intervene in the situation. There was a march from the northern city of Haifa to Jerusalem a year ago by mothers of victims. Protests have been staged in recent weeks, once again calling on government authorities to prioritize intervention in criminal activities in Arab communities.

What is clear is that the Arab communities themselves are not prepared to tackle their own problems. Even when murders are committed between Palestinians by criminal gangs, in honour killings, in clan disagreements, the solution is to call on Israeli police to intervene. When complaints among Arab Israeli citizens are rife of police interfering in their lives, of targeting Arab Israelis, in a population where distrust and anger is a fact of life.