Arab minorities a chance for Israel

Minorities in Israel

The existence of ethnic minorities in a country is quite a common thing worldwide. The particularism in Israel is linked to its historical and regional context, to its religious dimension, and to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Historically, the ancestral presence of Jews and Arabs on the current Israel land, the recent creation of the Israeli State, combine to create an oppositional situation between both ethnies. This situation is all the more amphasazied, that Israel is regionally isolated amongst Arab countries.

The religious difference creates an additional factor of opposition in Israel. Although Islam on side and Judaïsm on the other are historically sisters, the two religions are also historically in confrontation. This conflictual situation has been empowered by the the implantation of a Jewish State in an Islamic local and regional environment.

The serial of wars between the surrounding Arab countries and Israel, extended by the ever lasting Israeli-Palestinian conflict, create an ambiguous position both for Arab minorities and Jewish mmajority within the Israeli nation. Arab minorities are confronted to a dual appartenance, Arab  and Israeli ones, Jewish majority is confronted to full acceptance  or differenciation of those minorities.

To those factors, is first added the internal differences within the global Israeli minority. Beside the most important israeli Arab community, the Druze and Beduin communities,  the Circassian population, although equally Arabic ethnic,  present specificities with particular relations with Israel State.

The pure dimensional side is in itself another peculiar element, since minorty represents 20% of israel population.