Will One Shopowner in Sachnin Save Our Country?

An amazing thing happened this week in the Arab Israeli city of Sachnin, in the Galilee. Ali Zabidat, owner of a chain of convenience stores in the city, was getting the usual threats from mafiosos because he was refusing to pay protection money. Not only verbal threats, but people were coming and shooting up his stores.

This is to be expected of any business owner in Israeli Arab society, especially in the Galilee. And what comes next is actual murder — sometimes the person who is refusing is the victim, but often those close to them, especially those in the family considered most successful, like doctors or lawyers.

This year (which has only been 24 days long) there have already been 21 such murders in the Arab Israeli community. It’s a huge problem that has gotten much worse since this government came into power. The government before it, the joint Lapid-Bennet, government, had a plan with programs in place to deal with this crisis. But Minister of Internal Security Ben-Gvir (who had promised in his campaign to deal with the problem) cancelled the programs and has been totally negligent in dealing with the crisis.

As Amir Basharat, strategic consultant for the mayors of Arab Israeli cities said yesterday: “There is a big problem that the minister who is responsible for our security is a convicted criminal who couldn’t care less that Arabs are being murdered.”

So, Ali Zabidat said he had enough and closed down his shops until further notice, said he was going on strike. An owner of other stores in the city joined him. Soon, all the businesses in the city joined in, too, and the city shut down. By Wednesday, other cities and villages in the area joined in. And by Thursday, Arab towns and cities in other parts of the country joined, the Arab Israeli school system shut down, and medical staff were called upon to strike as well.

There was a big march and demonstration Thursday afternoon in Sachnin, which I was honored to join, and bring along others from my kibbutz, Hannaton, which is twenty-five minutes from Sachnin and right next to where my kids studied in the Galil Arab-Jewish bi-lingual Hand-in-Hand school. I saw many families and faculty from the school there.

The majority of the marchers were Arab, but there were a lot of Jews there too. I’d say maybe ten percent of the people, which is not bad at all, considering that it was inside an Arab city on a workday when only the Arab community was on strike. And what is also notable is that we were there not just in solidarity; our message was unified and clear, that this is not just an Arab problem; it is a problem in Israeli society as a whole.

My sign read: “Only Together We Can!” I saw other signs that read: “Security For ALL!” and “One Society, One Fate”. When one part of the society is suffering, we all suffer. And, even if that is not enough of a reason for some to join the struggle, when there is violence in one part of the society, it will eventually reach everyone. With a Minister of Internal Security who not only doesn’t protect all the country’s citizens (including anyone who participates in protests against the government) but even incites against them and sends police to intimidate them, we are all in danger.

It was truly glorious to be there, after being part of this struggle for years — demonstrating, visiting bereaved families, even standing in different Arab towns in my area in the Galilee every Friday with my local Standing Together circle for the past several months against the organized crime and the government’s willful negligence around it. I was waiting for something like this to happen, and finally it did!

We were stuck in a traffic jam as we drew closer to the city (a good sign!), and when we got there, the streets were full of hordes of protesters gathering to march. Parking was a free-for-all, with people putting their cars wherever they could (on the sidewalk, in alleyways, etc…), and the stores were all closed and gated. It was a dramatic sight to behold.

The amount of police there was out of proportion to the character of the event. There were tons of police — some on horseback, some on foot, even a helicopter above us! They were looking ready for violence. But there was none, of course. This was a peaceful protest. There were whole families there — elderly, children.

All of Israeli Arab society is in crisis over the organized crime. Friends of mine in Arab towns do not let their kids leave the house after dark. People are afraid to open businesses. They just want to live; that is their request. If only this much police was sent to deal with the organized crime that ignited this march — defending innocent citizens against criminals not treating innocent citizens like criminals! — we’d be in much better shape.

It was hard to tell how many people were there while in the midst of the march, but when I got home, I discovered there had been at least 50,000 people there, and there were parallel demonstrations in other parts of the country, especially in the Bedouin city of Rahat in the south. I heard that all over the country, about 100,000 people came out to protest.

This was huge, an amazing wave of protest that truly began from the bottom up with the brave act of one man. Anger and frustration have been brewing for years on this issue, and it finally came to a boil with Ali Dabidat’s decision to take a stand and hope that others would overcome their fear and despair and join him.

And the protests continue. Friday, there was a massive Muslim prayer service/protest in the center of the city, and Saturday the schools were closed and protests continued in many Arab cities around the country. A former mayor of Kafr Yasif was arrested, and after another homicide took place in Nazareth (37-year-old Jamal Mazawi was shot in the head), a spontaneous demonstration took place in teh main square of the city.

They have not announced yet about Monday — there is no school in most of the Arab schools here on Fridays and Sundays, and there is school on Saturdays — but my guess is that protests will continue. There is a big conference scheduled for this coming Thursday in Nazareth with at least 80 bereaved families from this organized crime participating, and there is a massive Arab-Jewish march and protest scheduled for Saturday in Tel Aviv.

The march in Sachnin was on the front page of most Israeli newspapers, and the heads of the Arab parties met after the march in Sachnin (they were all there) and signed an agreement to create a joint Arab list for the upcoming elections. This could be what makes a difference between being stuck with our current government again or not. That, and the other opposition parties embracing the idea of forming a coalition with Arab parties. Because as my sign read — only together we can!

So who knows? One man named Ali Zabidat may be the person who saves this country!