The IDF helps the Christian Israeli-Arab soldiers

Video Of The Week - Female Arab Soldier in the IDF - https://tinyurl.com/y9kps4tw

The IDF has created a unique unit so that Israeli-Arab Christians can fulfill their ambition to overcome the language barrier and serve their country. 

By: United with Israel Staff

The IDF has launched a unique program for Israeli-Arab Christianswhich enables them to integrate into the army and serve their country.

The Nachshon Platoon consists of 24 Arabic-speaking Christians who volunteered to join the IDF based on one motivation: to contribute to the State of Israel.

After years of low draft percentages among the Arabic-speaking Christian community in Israel, no more than a dozen draftees a year, things have now changed. In the latest draft class, 24 soldiers of the Arabic-speaking Christian community volunteered to serve in the IDF.

The motivated soldiers began their military service with a three-week preparatory program at the Michve Alon training base in Israel’s north to overcome their biggest challenge: Hebrew.

The Nachshon Platoon was established especially for the Arabic-speaking Christian population in Israel. It’s a place of education with a familial atmosphere.

“The preparations for the culminating ceremony make me very emotional,” said Lt. Sapir, commander of the Eyal Company, where the soldiers were first taken in.

“They’re amazing soldiers and their Hebrew has improved unbelievably. I’m sure they will go far in their service,” she added. “Our goal was to improve their Hebrew level with the understanding that they’re aiming for significant positions that require a proficient level of Hebrew.”

The course mostly consists of Hebrew lessons, along with lessons about heritage and connection to Israel, and additional subjects related to the soldiers’ unique identities.

“The fact that Arabic-speaking Christians have a course and a platoon of their own strengthens the idea that the IDF is a place that does, and always will, care for them,” explained Nachshon Platoon Commander Lt. Shlomit, who accompanied the soldiers throughout their training.

“The platoon is going to open a door for the whole Arabic-speaking Christian community,” Lt. Gardi, the course commander said.

‘Contributing to My Country’

Pvt. Assad, one of the course graduates, expresses pride in successfully completing the course, and his satisfaction is evident in every word he says.

“I used to not speak Hebrew at all. I knew almost nothing, but the course has made me comfortable with the language and I’ve tremendously improved,” he shared.

“The platoon is like a family, like brothers- far more than friends,” he said emotionally. “Everyone helps one another. We’re a team, something larger together.”

Assad grew up in an Arabic-speaking Christian family in northern Israel. His desire to volunteer in the IDF comes from a surprising place.

“My father is a truck driver. I wanted to be like him, to make him proud of me but it was important for me to contribute to my country as I am a part of it,” he explained.

As he had hoped, Pvt. Assad will soon begin his service as a cargo truck driver. “The course has provided me with the integration that I wanted and I am very pleased.”

Pvt. Tazmuz’s favorite word in Hebrew is self-confidence. “It’s what has improved the most in me,” he shares. “I have a good feeling about the job I’m going to be doing, but it’s not enough for me. I want to be an officer- that’s the largest contribution I can give.”

“Since its establishment, the IDF has been the people’s army, serving as a way to bring together all the different communities in Israel to meet,” concluded Lt. Col. Dorit Maoz,  the Michve Alon Base commander. “We all have a common house within the IDF, with mutual values, responsibility, and caring for each other.”

Approximately 20 percent of Israel’s eight million citizens are Arabs. According to the Israeli Democracy Index, a public opinion survey conducted last year by the Israeli Democratic Institute and the Guttman Center for Surveys, 65% of Israeli-Arabs are proud to be Israeli.

Israel is the only safe haven for Christians in the Middle East, while their numbers diminish as a result of Muslim persecution in all other areas of the region.

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2 Israeli Arabs confess to starting wildfires

For the full article go to “Times Of Israel” http://tinyurl.com/z3jrx9r

Police chief Roni Alsheich says arson attacks are nothing new; cops prepared to treat cases as terrorism.

Two Israeli Arabs arrested on suspicion of deliberately starting brush fires have confessed to the crimes, police reportedly told ministers at the weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday.

The suspects were said to from the Israeli Arab towns of Umm al-Fahm and Deir Hanna in northern Israel, the Hebrew-language Ynet news website reported. The report did not specify which fires the two admitted to igniting or offer details on the suspects.

While many of the fires that ravaged towns and cities nationwide since Tuesday have been caused by negligence, officials say at least some of the blazes were started by nationalistically motivated Arab arsonists and have vowed to crack down on the perpetrators.

On Sunday, officials offered assurances that the wave of wildfires that swept across the country over the past six days had mostly come to an end, at least for the time being, but fresh blazes were later reported in northern Israel.

At least 35 people have been arrested since Thursday on suspicion of setting fires or inciting others to do so. More than 15 were Palestinians arrested by the Israel Defense Forces and Shin Bet security service, an army spokesperson said. At least 10 of those held are Israeli Arabs, according to Hebrew media reports. Police did not offer a detailed breakdown of how many were being detained for incitement and how many for arson.

Police chief Roni Alsheich said Sunday that there had been similar arson attacks in the past and that they should be considered acts of terror, Army Radio reported.

“If setting the fire was deliberate it is definitely terror,” Alsheich said during a visit to the West Bank settlement of Halamish, where a fire destroyed 18 homes on Friday night. “By the way, that is nothing new, there have been arson incidents in the past. The concentration of a relatively large number of days, and the number of incidents and the weather conditions, brought about these results but there is nothing new and there were incidents like this in the past.”

Alsheich said the security services are equipped to deal with terror and hinted that Israel was prepared to employ more stringent measures if necessary.

“We have good tools for dealing with terror — we haven’t yet taken advantage of them; we will review things and if we think that the measures are lacking we will demand them… There are sufficient measures in the Israeli book of laws.”

Earlier Sunday, Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman said there was “proof” that 17 of 110 recorded wildfires were caused by arsonists, and authorities “were still investigating the other incidents.”

Authorities estimate that since Tuesday, some 130,000 dunams (32,124 acres) have been destroyed, approximately 30 percent more than a major blaze in the forests around Haifa six years ago.

Haifa city officials said Saturday that this week’s fires torched some 28,000 dunams (6,900 acres) of land in the city since Thursday.

At least 60,000 of the city’s residents were evacuated Thursday while firefighters battled to contain a blaze that had entered a dozen of the city’s neighborhoods from the nearby Carmel Forest.

Most had returned home by Sunday morning, but an estimated 1,600 residents remained without homes. Between 400 and 530 apartments were said to be completely destroyed by the flames. Dozens of homes in other locales have also been damaged by separate wildfires during the wave.

It was not immediately clear that the motive of all the arsonists was terrorism. Israeli security officials on Saturday night gave preliminary indications that weather conditions were the prime cause of the initial wave of fires. From Wednesday and into the weekend, security officials and politicians indicated that arson was being investigated in some cases.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Friday there was “no doubt” some of the fires were started deliberately. “There is a price to pay for the crimes committed, there is a price to pay for arson terrorism,” he said.

The Magen David Adom rescue service reported Saturday that among the 133 people treated by the organization for fire-related injuries, one was seriously hurt and three others were moderately injured.

Throughout the week, firefighting equipment from the US, Russia, Turkey, Greece, France, Spain, Canada and the Palestinian Authority joined Israeli crews in dumping tons of water and retardants on the fires around Israel and the West Bank.

Video of the week: Wild fires rage in Israel http://tinyurl.com/nco4cfx 

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The Israel Narrative Is Wrong

By Evelyn Gordon June 21, 2016

For the full article go to: http://tinyurl.com/h5uo4q9

The standard narrative about Israel these days goes like this: The current government is the most right-wing ever, the public is increasingly racist and anti-democratic, and the prime minister is either a right-wing zealot or a coward afraid to challenge his right-wing base. But the most remarkable part of this narrative is how durable it has proven despite all evidence to the contrary.

The latest such evidence comes from today’s Jerusalem Post report about a massive drop in construction in the settlements. According to the Central Bureau of Statistics, housing starts in the settlements plummeted by 53 percent in the first quarter, compared to an 8.1 percent decline in housing starts nationwide. Needless to say, one would expect settlement construction to soar under Israel’s “most right-wing government ever” and a prime minister captive to his right-wing base. Yet in fact, as I’ve written before, the “right-wing” Benjamin Netanyahu has consistently built less in the settlements than any of his left-wing predecessors–a fact that never seems to disturb proponents of the “far-right extremist” narrative.

Even more noteworthy was a pair of reports in the left-wing daily Haaretz earlier this month about two unprecedented moves to boost equality for Israeli Arabs. The first report noted that the Council for Higher Education, chaired by Education Minister Naftali Bennett of the right-of-center Jewish Home party, is advancing plans for Israel’s first ever BA-granting college in an Arab town. Until now, the only institutes of higher education in Arab towns have been teacher’s colleges. But a tender to set up a BA-granting college closed on May 31, and the CHE is now reviewing the five bids it received. The winner is expected to be announced in another few months, and the new institution is slated to open next year. To help it succeed, the government has promised millions of shekels in start-up funds plus an annual budget of 20 to 40 million shekels (depending on enrollment).

The new institution is expected to significantly increase the number of Arabs, and especially Arab women, obtaining BAs, because many will now be able to live at home and commute to college. Not only will this eliminate the expense of renting apartments near campus, but it also solves the access problem for women from conservative Arab families who are barred by social norms from living away from home.

The second report described two moves to ease the housing shortage in Arab communities. First, a government planning committee decided to build a new neighborhood in the Arab city of Taibeh, which “will be one of the largest building plans in the Arab sector to have been approved for many years,” the report noted. Second, the Interior Ministry approved a decision to take land from the Jewish jurisdiction of Misgav and give it to the Arab town of Sakhnin. The report also noted that these decisions are merely the latest in “an increasing number” over the past year and a half intended “to accelerate development in the Arab sector, after many decades of neglect and inaction.”

Like the drop in settlement construction, these efforts on behalf of Israeli Arabs don’t exactly fit the narrative of a government and public mired in right-wing extremism. Indeed, they contradict it so blatantly that even Haaretz reporter Nimrod Bousso couldn’t ignore it. “One cannot help but wonder why this change is finally taking place under the leadership of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the man who never seems to miss a chance to demonstrate hostility toward the group that makes up a fifth of Israel’s population … and whose government has a significant number of members with nationalist views,” he wrote in his news story on the Taibeh and Sakhnin decisions.

The answer, of course, is that the narrative is simply wrong on every count. Diplomatically speaking, as I’ve noted before, this government is actually one of the more left-wing in Israel’s history: Though Netanyahu doesn’t consider a two-state solution achievable right now, he does accept the idea in principle; in contrast, during Israel’s first 45 years of existence, all governments from both left and right considered a Palestinian state anathema. And Netanyahu’s policy of restraining settlement construction – which, contrary to his “cowardly” image, he has maintained despite considerable opposition from parts of his base – is consistent with his stated commitment to a two-state solution.

Moreover, as the examples above show, his past three governments have actually been among the most progressive in Israel’s history in terms of their practical efforts to improve Arab integration. And unlike his settlement policy, his efforts to advance Arab equality have sparked no significant opposition from either his cabinet or his electorate, even though Israeli Arabs overwhelmingly vote for his political opponents. 

The reason is simple: Any government which considers Israeli-Palestinian peace unachievable in the foreseeable future has no choice but to invest in Israel’s internal development, in order to ensure that the country is strong enough to survive without peace. And improving Arab integration is crucial to the country’s internal development because Israeli Arabs, currently underrepresented in both higher education and the work force, represent one of the main potential sources of future economic growth.

But proponents of the “far-right-extremism” narrative seem utterly impervious to the facts. So they can only scratch their heads in puzzlement over why Israel’s “most right-wing government ever” is precisely the one that’s taking far-reaching steps to improve the lot of Israeli Arabs.

Video of the week: Syrian Refugees vs. Palestinian "Refugees" http://tinyurl.com/hztocd2

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