Anyone familiar with the Arab street in Israel knows that there is one scary word there, a word that those who use it are convinced that people connected to it are hiding around every corner: "Shin Bet." Many members of the Arab sector would often tell me that the military administration that existed from the 1950s to the 1960s never really ended because the Shin Bet security agency remained involved in its daily life, local and national politics, and many appointments.
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I admit that I hoped this was an exaggeration, and it might have been. But when I was brought face to face with facts like a senior Education Ministry official who held office for years being paid a salary by the Shin Bet and responsible for a long line of appointments at Arab public schools – I realized there was something to it.
The willingness of some of the Arab leadership and many in the Arab public to back bringing the Shin Bet into the war on crime that is rife in the sector is testimony to how sick Arab Israelis are of organized crime and how willing they are to grab on to anything that will oust it from their lives.
The Shin Bet was not designed to fight mafias in Arab communities, but it also wasn't established to fight COVID. If the government and the Knesset can use the Shin Bet to handle a specific issue, for a predetermined period of time, as happened with COVID, this could definitely be an option for fighting violence in the sector.
The government's decision this week did not make use of the laws about the scope of the Shin Bet mandate, and talks about "marginal help" from the organization (possibly a request from its leaders). But article 7a of the law explicitly states that the organization is supposed to address matters defined by the government and approved by the Knesset committee that oversees the service that are supposed to protect and promote vital interests for Israel's national security. If in the past the various governments of Israel thought that hiring teachers for Arab schools was such a "vital interest," it wouldn't be too ridiculous to think that fighting the hair-raising violence in Arab communities is not.
Meanwhile, when it comes to Sheikh Jarrah, the Supreme Court is doing the work for us. The dispute over the Sheikh Jarrah property turned into the core of clashes that led to Operation Guardian of the Walls and was raised in a conversation between US President Joe Biden and Prime Minister Naftali Bennett. It's about a few buildings that were owned by Jews before the War of Independence and since then have been in Jordanian hands, which gave them to Palestinian families. The Nahalat Shimon organization located the Jewish owners, bought the homes from them, and wanted to evict the Palestinians who had been living there for years. (Israeli law, of course, does not allow the Palestinians to sue for lost homes in the west of the city…) The court approved the eviction, and the High Court tried to convince all sides to reach a compromise.
Because no compromised was secured and the government tried to postpone the eviction for fear of creating a needless uproar, it was the court that suggested that the tenants be allowed to remain for years, their status protected, and pay a monthly sum to the owners. The sides have until Nov. 2 to respond to this offer. By then, we'll really know who wants to get something done and who wants to make a mess.
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