Texas Jewish Post (Fort Worth, Tex.), Vol. 42, No. 6, Ed. 1 Thursday, February 5, 1987 Page: 2 of 20
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TEXAS JEWISH POST THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1987 PAGE 2
the cutting GCIQO_The Markovitch Report |
BY EDWIN BLACK
^Jerusalem is about to inaugurate a quiet
revolution in its treatment of Israeli Arabs. After
years of debate, the Cabinet will soon approve a
comprehensive housing plan for the State’s Arab
population. In so doing, Israel hopes to blunt the
steady alienation of 600,000 of its own citizens,
and embark upon the long road toward equal
treatment of minorities.
For decades, Israeli Christian and Moslem Arab
villages have been virtually devoid of any
cohesive housing plan. As a result, thousands of
illegal Arab homes have been built, many facing
court-ordered demolition. After protracted ap-
peals, these court orders have now become af-
firmed and final - raising the specter of mass
demolitions of Arab dwellings. Unwilling to un-
dertake such an onerous campaign against its
own citizenry, the government has decided to
bend.
The soon to be announced government policy
is outlined in the so-called "Markovitch Report,”
compiled by Yaakov Markovitch, deputy director
of the Interior Ministry. Few government officials
will comment on the specifics of report, because
the Cabinet itself has not had a chance to review
it. But among its fifty recommendations is this
pivotal one: "legitimize” en masse nearly all the
illegal and unlicensed Arab structures in
existence prior to March 1986, thus averting the
need to destroy thousands of residences.
"Yes, you can say 'Muhammad has come to
the mountain’," remarked Markovitch about the
government decision to abandon enforcement
efforts under the weight of the numbers. Moshe
Arens, minister without portfolio in charge of
minority affairs, concedes, "We had no choice,
we had to legitimize these buildings - there
were some 6000 in question.” Arens' chief ad-
visor on the subject, Amos Gilboa explains, "We
are not Russia. "We just could not do it (destory
6000 homes). So instead we are legitimizing
them.”
Arab housing is what one government official
euphemistically termed an "historical problem.”
Jewish leaders are at a loss to explain why a
nation so accomplished at community planning
allowed so chaotic a situation to develop in its
Arab areas. "For forty years, the government did
not give us a just housing solution,” explains
Labor MK Abed Darawshe, who sits on the
Knesset’s Interior Committee. "So the (Arab)
population was obligated to find its own
solution, and build on private (Arab) lands - not
because they wanted to breach the law - but
because there was no other solution.”
Lack of initial planning in Arab villages was
complicated by Israel’s continuing lack of atten-
tion to the Arab sector’s growing needs. "In the
last thirty years there has been a big change in
the economic situation for Israeli Arabs,” ex-
plains Markovitch. "Many have found jobs in the
cities and no longer (work) as farmers. Status
among Arab families is gained by someone who
has a new and good home. So when they saw
buildings in the Jewish sector, and they wanted
to improve their standard of living the same
way.”
But Arabs who owned residential land did not
want to sell or subdivide it to other villagers. So
new residential land was needed. Flowever, no
one submitted revised master plans to the plan-
ning authorities. "Consequently, there simply
has not been zoning for Arab homes," states
David dayman, Jerusalem director of the
American Jewish Congress, who is familiar with
the problem. "Plus, there was a whole series of
inequities in the system itself that required
Arabs to build illegally.”
Markovitz admits that many of these buildings,
although constructed without a permit, "were of
very high quality.” But they were built
haphazardly, often far from the city or village in-
frastructure, such as roads, sewers or utilities.
"Many of these high standard buildings have no
telephone or electricity, or they are located right
where a future road or electrical station is to be
built," he added. "This is no way for a village or
a country to grow.”
But as worrisome to officials as the haphazard
growth was "the concept of doing things against
the law.” As minority affairs advisor Gilboa ex-
plains, "A modern country cannot have extra-
legal activity as a norm.” Israeli Arabs counter
that the laws are especially enforced against
them, while illegal Jewish construction is
ignored. There is certainly truth to that, but rigid
housing and land use codes have been enforced
against Jewish families as well. Tel Aviv city of-
ficials have been warring for years against illegal
prejudice in the case of Arabs (and housing
regulations),” says Clayman, "but both Jews and
Arabs must abide by them.” Clayman likened
Israel’s Arab housing problem to America’s
illegal immigration problem. In that case too,
mass amnesty emerged the only solution.
Ironically, while it was the Peres government
(acting on the suggestion of Ezer Weizman)
which commissioned the Markovitch Report,
Shimon Peres refused to move on any of its
recommendations when initially submitted just
before rotation. "It was as though someone had
placed it under a rock,” observes Amos Gilboa.
Peres people answer that time was simply
needed for the various ministries to add their in-
put. In any event, when Moshe Arens succeeded
Weizman as minister in charge of minority af-
"Tes, you can say 'Muhammad has come
to the mountain'/' —Yaakov Markovitch
"We had no choice, we had to legitimize
these buildings — there were some 6000 in
question." - Moshe Arens
"We are not Russia. "We just could not do
it (destroy 6000 homes). So instead we are
legitimizing them."
— Amos Gilboa
Jewish housing there; demolitions orders have
certainly been carried out.
Such incidents are as emotional to Jews as
Arabs. In one celebrated demolition near Tel
Aviv, the resisting building owner was shot by
policemen. In another, just a few days ago, the
unlicensed hovel of a pleading 80 year old
Jewish woman was destroyed, even as she in-
voked Jewish prayers and wailed "Pogrom!”
"Yes, there may have been a background of
fairs, Arens made the Markovitch Report a
priority.
About two weeks ago, Arens met privately with
Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir to recruit his
support. "Shamir reacted well,” recounts a
source close to Arens. An aide to Shamir recoun-
ts that for the Prime Minister, it was less the
question of minority rights than maintaining the
integrity of Israeli law that was most compelling.
At the same time, Labor MK Darawshe obtained
Peres' full support. The Likud and Labor leaders
"I think we can sell it to the
Cabinet/'. . ."and I know we
can sell it to the Arabs. But the
Jewish public—that's the un-
predictable part of this equation."
are expected to obtain full Cabinet approval for
the Report within the coming two weeks.
However, as of this writing, most Cabinet of-
ficials have yet to see the Report. For that mat-
ter, neither have concerned Israeli Arab officials
- including Labor MK Abed Darawshe himself -
seen the document. "No Arab has seen it,”
complains Darawshe. "We demanded it from the
Interior Ministry — it belongs to us! And thev
have promised - but so far, did not give it.” Un-
der 100 pages, the blue-jacketed Report has not
yet been translated into Arabic. The first section
is devoted to the 50 recommendations. Aerial
photographs of Arab communities follow, with
every illegal structure as of March 1986 marked
off. Complex information tables throughout the
subsequent text provide the data supporting the
Report's liberal conclusions.
Once adopted, the Report is certain to create
broad social and political consequences. "Most
importantly, it will solve 95 percent of the
current problem,” according to MK Darawshe.
Indeed, the only Arab houses not saved from
demolition are those overtly interfering with
planned roads or village services. "Young Arab
couples,” adds Amos Gilboa, "comprising most
of the people typically living in these houses, will
now be able to flourish without feeling the con-
stant threat of a demolition order. They will have
some place to live that is legal." Arens con-
tinues, "This will prove (to Arabs) that the Israeli
government has finally opened its eyes to their
problems.”
On the sensitive subject of Israeli Arab loyalty,
MK Darawshe asserts that the Markovitch Report
will be adopted not a moment too soon. "A lot of
people today feel bitterness,” says Darawshe.
"They are living under the risk that their houses
will be destroyed. I doubt that loyalty can con-
tinue among a younger generation that continues
to live under this threat.”
But observers caution that the seeds of the
next housing crisis will be quickly sown unless
future policy radically changes. Comparing the
Markovitch Report to the original Simpson-Maz-
zoli immigration legislation, David Clayman of
the American Jewish Congress' Jerusalem office
declares, "Unless there is a resolution of the
basic inequities, then this kind of amnesty is not
going to help.”
Advocates of the Report, however, promise that
enlarged municipal limits and a new and ac-
cessible building policy are among the reforms.
And henceforth no exceptions will be permitted
beyond the new regulations. "This time, we will
bulldoze these houses before they get started,
and before any family moves in to start a new
life there,” promises one Interior Ministry of-
ficial.
Ironically, the more effective the Markovitch
recommendations are, the more controversial the
measures will be once announced. "There will
be a massive hue and cry from the Jewish sector
from people who had their houses destroyed,”
predicts Clayman. "It will create a backlash of
people saying, 'Why for them, and not for us.’ ”
Moreover, the prospect of expanding Arab
municipal limits is certain to provoke the Jewish
settlement movements and rightwing elements
which have been unable to extend their own
communities.
"I think we can sell it to the Cabinet,” com-
mented one government official, "and I know we
can sell it to the Arabs. But the Jewish public -
that’s the unpredictable part of this equation.”
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• • e •
Edwin Black is the author of The Transfer
Agreement: The Cntolii Story of
the Seeret I*act Between the Third
Keich and Jewish Palestine (Macmillan),
winner of the Carl Sandburg Award for the best nonfiction of;
1984 and nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. His weekly
column written from Jerusalem is syndicated to 39 Jewish
newspapers throughout America.
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Wisch, J. A. & Wisch, Rene. Texas Jewish Post (Fort Worth, Tex.), Vol. 42, No. 6, Ed. 1 Thursday, February 5, 1987, newspaper, February 5, 1987; Fort Worth, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth755511/m1/2/?q=mission+rosario: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; .