Arab citizens of Israel
The Arab citizens of Israel (Arab Israelis or Israeli Arabs) are the country's largest ethnic minority.[4][5] They are colloquially referred to in Arabic as either 48-Arabs (عرب ٤٨ ‘Arab Thamāniya wa-Arba‘īn) or 48-Palestinians (فلسطينيو ٤٨ Filasṭīniyyū Thamāniya wa-Arba‘īn),[6] denoting the fact that they have remained in Israeli territory since the Green Line was agreed upon between Israel and the Arab countries as part of the 1949 Armistice Agreements.[7] According to several sources, the majority of Arabs in Israel now prefer to be identified as Palestinian citizens of Israel.[8][9][10] International media outlets often use the term "Arab-Israeli" or "Israeli-Arab" to distinguish Israel's Arab citizens from the Palestinian Arabs residing in the Israeli-occupied territories.[11] They are formerly, or are descended from, those Arabs who belonged to the British Mandate for Palestine through Palestinian Citizenship Order 1925. Speakers of both Arabic and Hebrew, they self-identify in a wide range of intersectional civic (Israeli or "in Israel"), national (Arab, Palestinian, Israeli), and religious (Muslim, Christian, Druze) identities.[12]
Following the 1948 Palestinian expulsion and flight, the Arabs who remained within Israel came under Israeli citizenship law, whereas those who were in the Jordanian-annexed West Bank came under Jordanian citizenship law. Those who were in the Egyptian-occupied Gaza Strip did not come under Egyptian citizenship law and were instead bound by the All-Palestine Protectorate, which had been created by Egypt during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. This three-way split for Palestinian Arabs' citizenship remained in place until the 1967 Arab–Israeli War, which resulted in Israel's ongoing occupation of the Palestinian territories. In 1988, Jordan renounced the 1950 sovereignty claim that it had laid to the West Bank, effectively rendering over 750,000 of the territory's Palestinian residents stateless. Through the Jerusalem Law of 1980 and the Golan Heights Law of 1981, Israel has granted citizenship eligibility to Palestinians in East Jerusalem and to Syrians and other Arabs in the Golan Heights; this status has not been extended to non-Jerusalemite Arabs in the West Bank—that is, those who live in what Israel governs as the Judea and Samaria Area. As a result of the Palestinian Declaration of Independence in 1988, the stateless Arab residents in the Palestinian territories eventually became recognized as Palestinian citizens and have been issued the Palestinian Authority passport since 1995.
The traditional vernacular of most Arab citizens of Israel is Levantine Arabic, including Lebanese Arabic in northern Israel, Palestinian Arabic in central Israel, and Bedouin Arabic across the Negev. Because the modern Arabic dialects of Israel's Arabs have absorbed many Hebrew loanwords and phrases, it is sometimes called the Israeli Arabic dialect.[13] More recently, there have been reports indicating that Arab Israelis are also increasingly feeling a sense of Israeli identity and are showing a desire for integration and shared future with mainstream Israeli society.[14][15] By religious affiliation, the majority of Arab Israelis are Muslims, but there are significant Christian and Druze minorities, among others.[16]
According to the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, the Israeli Arab population stood at 2.1 million people in 2023, accounting for 21% of Israel's total population.[1] The majority of these Arab citizens identify themselves as Arab or Palestinian by nationality and as Israeli by citizenship.[17][18][19] They mostly live in Arab-majority towns and cities, some of which are among the poorest in the country, and generally attend schools that are separated to some degree from those attended by Jewish Israelis.[20] Arab political parties traditionally did not join governing coalitions until 2021, when the United Arab List became the first to do so.[21] In 2017, a survey reported by The Jerusalem Post showed that 60% of Arab Israelis viewed the country favourably, with this figure represented by 49% of Muslim Arabs, 61% of Christian Arabs, and 94% of Druze Arabs.[22] The Druze and the Bedouin in the Negev and the Galilee have historically expressed the strongest non-Jewish affinity to Israel and are more likely to identify as Israelis than other Arab citizens.[23][24][25][26]
Under Israeli law, Arab residents of East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights have the right to become Israeli citizens, are entitled to municipal services, and have municipal voting rights.[27] In tandem, citizenship acquisition is scarce: only 5% of Palestinians in East Jerusalem were Israeli citizens in 2022. Originally, the lack of applications for citizenship was largely due to Palestinian society's disapproval of naturalization as complicity with Israel's occupation. After the Second Intifada, this taboo began to fade, but the Israeli government re-configured the process to make it more difficult, approving only 34% of new Palestinian applications and giving a plethora of reasons for rejection. Non-citizen Palestinians cannot vote in Israel's legislative elections and must get a laissez-passer to travel abroad; many jobs are closed to them and Israel can revoke their residency status, whereby they may lose their health insurance and their right to enter Jerusalem.[28]
History
1948 Arab–Israeli War
Most Jewish Israelis refer to the 1948 Arab–Israeli War as the War of Independence, while most Arab citizens refer to it as al-Nakba (the catastrophe), a reflection of differences in perception of the purpose and outcomes of the war.[69][70]
In the aftermath of the 1947–49 war, the territory previously administered by the British Empire as Mandatory Palestine was de facto divided into three parts: the State of Israel, the Jordanian-held West Bank, and the Egyptian-held Gaza Strip. Of the estimated 950,000 Arabs that lived in the territory that became Israel before the war,[71] over 80% fled or were expelled. The other 20%, some 156,000, remained.[72] Arab citizens of Israel today are largely composed of the people who remained and their descendants. Others include some from the Gaza Strip and the West Bank who procured Israeli citizenship under family-unification provisions made significantly more stringent in the aftermath of the Second Intifada.[73]
Arabs who left their homes during the period of armed conflict, but remained in what had become Israeli territory, were considered to be "present absentees". In some cases, they were refused permission to return to their homes, which were expropriated and turned over to state ownership, as was the property of other Palestinian refugees.[74][75] Some 274,000, or 1 of every 4 Arab citizens of Israel are "present absentees" or internally displaced Palestinians.[76][77] Notable cases of "present absentees" include the residents of Saffuriyya and the Galilee villages of Kafr Bir'im and Iqrit.[78]
Intercommunal relations
Surveys and polls
In a 2004 survey by Sammy Smooha of the University of Haifa Jewish-Arab Center, 85% of Israeli Arabs stated that Israel has a right to exist as an independent state, and 70% that it has a right to exist as a democratic, Jewish state.[399][400] A Truman Institute survey from 2005 found that 63% of the Arab citizens accepted the principle that Israel is the state of the Jewish people.[36][401]
A 2006 poll by the Arab advocacy group the Center Against Racism showed negative attitudes towards Arabs. The poll found that 63% of Jews believe Arabs are a security threat; 68% would refuse to live in the same building as an Arab; 34% believe that Arab culture is inferior to Israeli culture. Support for segregation between Jewish and Arab citizens was higher among Jews of Middle Eastern origin.[402]
Relations with other Palestinians
During the 2021 Israel–Palestine crisis, according to Al Arabiya, Fatah backed a call for a general strike on 18 May 2021 in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem and Palestinians in Israel were asked to take part.[436] In an unusual display of unity by "Palestinian citizens of Israel, who make up 20% of its population, and those in the territories Israel seized in 1967"[d][438] the strike went ahead and "shops were shuttered across cities in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and in villages and towns inside Israel".[439]
