Head of the High Follow-Up Committee for Arab Citizens in Israel, Mohammad Barakeh (center), addresses the protesters gathered in Be'er-Sheva last Monday. At the extreme right of the picture is Hadash MK Yousef Jabareen and next to him MK Ofer Cassif.

Arab-Bedouin Protest Negev Land Grabs by the Racist JNF and ILA

Hundreds of Arab-Bedouin protested on Monday morning, June 22, outside the regional administrative compound in Be’er-Sheva to denounce the far-right government’s policy of house demolitions and evacuation orders against unrecognized Arab villages in the Negev. The High Follow-Up Committee for Arab Citizens of Israel called for the demonstration and among the hundreds of participants were Hadash…

A Young Communist League of Israel mural in Nazareth on May Day; in Arabic and Hebrew the red banner reads: "Long live the 1st of May, the international day of popular solidarity with the working class."

Communist Youth Leader: “This Government of Netanyahu is a Betrayal of the People’s Mandate”

The Communist Party-led front, Hadash (The Democratic Front for Peace and Equality), has emerged as a major force among Leftist groups in Israel. In the recently concluded elections for the Knesset, Hadash displaced the exhausted Zionist left bloc of the Labor and Meretz. Last week Peoples Dispatch talked to Arafat Bdarny, Secretary-General of the YoungCommunist…

Leftist activists blocked Herzl Street in Tel Aviv last Sunday, June 14, to protest Israel's imminent annexation of the occupied Palestinian territories. The white banner to the left reads: "Israel is not a democracy… Apartheid."

More Protests against Annexation of Occupied Palestinian Territories

Dozens of leftist activists blocked Herzl Street in Tel Aviv last Sunday, June 14, to protest Israel’s “colonialist policies and plans to formally annex” occupied Palestinian territories. The protesters barricaded the central downtown road with concrete barriers and fences, on which they raised banners in Hebrew, Arabic and English reading: “No to annexation, No to apartheid”…

"Tough guys": Body language trumps all – MKs from Yamina during the tour they conducted in the Negev, last Thursday, June 11; Don't let the macho poses confuse you – these people are dangerous. Smotrich is second from right with arms folded. Yamina's leader, with even a more aggressive pose, is MK Naftali Bennet (third from left), Defense Minister in the previous government. Today, Yamina is in the opposition, in part because, with Netanyahu's hyper-inflated cabinet, they couldn't get the portfolios they sought; in part to outflank the Likud from the right. In the center, wearing the green blouse and brandishing a less "in your face" stance is MK Ayelet Sheked, a former Justice Minister who was and is committed to delimiting and weakening the status of the Supreme Court (High Court of Justice), so that the Knesset can be absolutely sovereign in fomenting ultra-right legislation that undermines universal human rights… Whose lives matter? According to Yamina's ideology, certainly not those of the Bedouin, let alone those of ay Arabs.

MK Smotrich from Racist Yamina: “Arab-Bedouin are a Time Bomb”

On Thursday, June 9, a racist far-right lawmaker called the birthrate among Arab-Bedouin women in the Negev desert a demographic “time bomb” that Israel needs to defuse. MK Bezalel Smotrich, Transportation Minister in Netanyahu’s previous government, made the remark during a tour of the Negev with fellow members of the Yamina (“Rightwards”) alliance. “This is the…