Many Arabs Show Their True Color

On Saturday night, 30,000 Israeli Arabs and their supporters marched en masse in Rabin Square in Tel-Aviv to protest against the newly passed Nation-State law.

While I dislike that law, our Israeli Arab citizens certainly have the right to march in protest against a law which discriminates against them. Specifically, I refer to an unnecessary change in a practice which has been in effect for the past 100 years.

When Great Britain accepted the mandate in Palestine in 1918 one of the first decrees was to declare three languages…Hebrew, Arabic and English… as the official languages of Palestine. No changes in that law were made when Israel declared its independence in 1948.  For 100 years the Arabic language has been recognized as one of the three official languages of Israel.  Until now.

Twenty-one percent of our Arabic speaking citizens have been humiliated by the Nation-State law which demotes Arabic to “special status” but no longer an official language.

I do not understand why such a clause was incorporated into the law since Arabic can be used in all government offices and institutions and courts in Israel.  It was, I believe, our “superiority complex” to remind our Arab citizens that we are the boss.  In so doing, we have wronged all of our Arab speakers of the Arabic language.  That discriminatory clause should be repealed.

However, regarding last night’s protest march in Tel-Aviv, many  Israeli Arabs only served to support the purpose of the Nation-State law and visibly strengthened the government’s position regarding the Jewishness of the State of Israel.  How did they do it? And why did they do it?

Israel’s Arabs marched waving the Palestinian flags.  By so doing, they showed that their loyalty was to Palestine and not to Israel. They had been advised prior to the protest march by the Arab leaders not to carry any Palestinian flags. They did not heed the advice and in so doing they shot themselves in their collective feet.

When 50,000 of our Druze citizens marched, they proudly held high thousands of Israeli flags, demonstrating their complete loyalty and devotion to the Jewish State of Israel.

Israeli Jews now have seen many of our Arab citizens in their true color. Palestine YES. Israel NO.  And for that foolish act, our Jewish citizens boil with anger and most have ceased to support the Arab demands for equality.

To be fair it must be noted that not all of our Israeli Arab community took part in the protest march. Many of them, particularly the Beduin, have given dedicated service to Israel.

Jewish voices are now loudly heard more than before. “If the Arabs want to be Palestinians and no longer citizens of Israel, they have the freedom to pack their belongings and cross the Allenby bridge into the Hashemite kingdom of Jordan which is historically 77% of mandate Palestine”.

I still fail to understand seventy years later why so many Arabs chose to live in our Jewish State rather than moving across the border to Jordan.  I guess it is because in Israel they have more rights and privileges than they could ever have in any Arab country.

That explains why more than 80% of our Arab population , when asked if they preferred to live in Israel or move into Palestine , opted to live in Israel.  They knew where their pita was buttered !

Marching with Palestinian flags was a visible sign of their disloyalty to Israel. And for that, they will have to pay dearly.

Prime Minister Netanyahu proclaimed to all Israelis that this Arab protest march signified clearly the need for a Nation-State law to be passed.

Very sadly, I am afraid, that this recent Arab protest will affect the Druze population and will weaken their petition to the High Court of Justice to amend or to repeal the law. Now it will be more difficult, if at all, to make changes in the new law.

The Druze, our most beloved and loyal citizens, should not have to suffer and pay the price for the stupidity of so many of Israel’s Arabs holding high the Palestinian flags.

Their true color has now been seen by the more than eight million citizens of Israel and their cause has lost the support of the majority of our citizens.

One is not a racist if he/she denies the legality of waving Palestinian flags on Israeli soil. By denying it, we are protecting the honor and the dignity of our Jewish State.

As the late Prime Minister Golda Meier once said of them, the Arabs never fail to learn from their mistakes; they just keep repeating them.

This recent protest event is one from which most of our Israeli Arabs will never recover.

Their cause is lost only because they themselves are lost.  Have no pity upon fools!