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THE ARAB DEMOGRAPHIC PROBLEM: A NEW APPROACH

by Professor Paul Eidelberg

1. Few people realize that Arab voting power in Israel influences how Jewish politicians deal with the Arab Palestinian problem. In 1992, the five Arab Knesset Members actually made Yitzhak Rabin prime minister in 1992, and Oslo followed. Israel's political elites have long been aware of the potential power of the Arab vote. On May 6, 1976, then Prime Minister Rabin addressed high school graduates about to enter the army and made a statement that sounds straight Kahane:

The majority of the people living in a Jewish State must be Jewish. We must prevent a situation of an insufficient Jewish majority and we dare not have a Jewish minority.... The minority is entitled to equal rights as individuals with respect to their distinct religion and culture, but not more than that.

2. Rabin is obviously referring to Israel's Arab inhabitants. He clearly implies that their rights as individuals do not include equal political rights! No one will say this today, if only because almost everyone's mentality has been thoroughly democratized.

3. In May 1976, however, Rabin's Labor Party was not dependent on the Arab vote as it was to become a year later when Labor's 29-year control of Israel's Government came to an end. Thereafter it would not be expedient to publicly suggest that the rights of Israel's Arab citizens do not include equal political rights.

4. Labor had not only lost the support of the religious parties, but its electoral base was shrinking. Religious Jews, with a much higher birthrate than secular Jews, were shifting to the less secular Likud Party. To regain power, Labor had to win the burgeoning Arab vote whose kinsmen were the Palestinian Arabs and whose champion was Yasser Arafat.

5. To put the Arab vote solidly in Labor's camp in the 1992 Knesset elections, it would be necessary (in violation of the law) to contact and solicit the support of Arafat in Tunis. The price was Oslo. In other words, Oslo was the price for Arab support in Israel's 1992 Knesset elections!

6. Today there are about 1.2 million Arab citizens of Israel, almost 20% of the country's population. Their birthrate is roughly three times that of Jews. Arabs may thus become a majority in three or four decades. Some demographers predict that Arabs will comprise 35% of Israel's population by 2020. If so, Israel would cease to be a viable Jewish state and would become, de facto, a bi-national state.

7. Suppose Arabs had 30% and not 35% of the Knesset's 120 seats. That would give them 36 seats. If they united, they might be the largest party in the Knesset, but certainly the second largest. They would have representatives on every major Knesset committee, including Intelligence. They would profoundly influence the laws and policies of the state and even affect the choice of the country's prime minister - they did so in 1992 with only five MKs!

8. Remember, Peres and Beilin and Lapid want to transform Israel into a "state of its citizens." Their parties, Labor (23), Yachad (6), and Shinui (15), now have 44 seats; so that with the support of 27 Arab MKs, Israel would indeed become a bi-national state. But not for long. Add a few more years and a few more Arabs MKs and the one-time Jewish state will become an Arab-Islamic state. No party in the Knesset is talking about this problem? - not publicly. Only political cowards would ignore this demographic problem (fearing the canard of racism)!

9. Israeli politicians ignore and even deny the fact that most of Israel's Arab citizens identify themselves as Palestinians and oppose the existence of the Jewish state. These Arabs are not merely a minority like the Hispanics or Blacks in America; they constitute a minority identified with Israel's enemies. They have a long record of aiding and participating in terrorist acts. 62% of them openly supported Saddam Hussein in a 1990 poll despite his threat to incinerate half the Jewish state. No wonder they are exempt from military service.

1. People need to face the truth: the democratic principle of one adult/one vote will enable these Arabs to control the Knesset and, by perfectly legal means, transform the Jewish state into an Arab state. Yet Israel's political and judicial and intellectual elites would have us believe there is no contradiction between democracy and a Jewish state! These elites are either ignoramuses or intellectual cowards.

2. They would have us believe Israel can solve its demographic problem by creating a Palestinian state in the "West Bank," to which Israel's Arab population may immigrate and there become citizens. Alternatively, these Arabs may remain in Israel, but their citizenship and their voting rights will be transferred to the new Palestinian state.

3. Israel's ruling elites refuse to take Arabs or Islam seriously. The Arabs of Israel are not only committed to Israel's demise, and are not only multiplying to hasten that end; but they have no intention of leaving Israel. Why should they?

4. Here they enjoy all the rights of Jews as well as educational opportunities unequalled in the Arab-Islamic world. In Israel they can refrain from paying taxes and receive subsidies for large-families to facilitate their eventual political ascendancy. Hence it is folly to try and solve Israel's internal demographic problem by creating a Palestinian state on Israel's vulnerable eastern border.

1. The most famous or infamous plan is that of the late Rabbi Kahane, and is often described by the title of his book They Must Go. Here are its major points:

2. This, in brief, is the Kahane Plan, which is a non-starter. Few Arabs will voluntarily leave, and no Israeli government is going to expel the rest. You're not going to have thousands upon thousands of Arabs on the borders of Israel, rotting away before CNN and BBC. No Arab state will accept them.

3. And so no party in the Knesset today speaks of the Israeli Arab demographic problem. Even Moshe Feiglin's Manhigut Yehudit faction of the Likud is silent about this issue. As for Baruch Marzel's new party, it can't liberate itself from Kahane's They Must Go.

Permit me to offer the "Eidelberg Plan," which has been adopted by the Yamin Israel Party. I believe it's the only rational plan in town. But its success depends on its being fully implemented within ten years.

The basic premise of this plan is this: The only way to solve Israel's "Arab demographic problem" is to make the State of Israel increasingly Jewish and proud on the one hand, and authentically democratic on the other! How can this be accomplished?

Most commentators will say: "Increase the Jewish content of public education." Of course, but the most expeditious way is by radical reform of Israel's political and judicial institutions.

First, reform Israel's parliamentary electoral system to increase the impact of Jewish convictions on those who make the laws and policies of the State. The only way to do this is to make legislators individually accountable to the voters in multi-district elections - the practice of 74 democracies. The existing system makes the entire country a single electoral district in which parties compete on the basis of proportional representation. This makes every vote count in apportioning Knesset seats. As a consequence, virtually every Jewish party seeks the support of Arab voters, which can only be purchased by compromising Jewish national interests.

Second, replace the inept, divisive, and irresponsible system of multi-party cabinet government with a Presidential system comparable to that of the United States. A Presidential system will be far more conducive to national unity, energy, and accountability. Arab parties will not longer have a role in deciding who will be the nation's chief executive - remember 1992!

Third, democratize the method of appointing the Supreme Court by making the nomination of judges subject to parliamentary confirmation. Parliamentary approval would make the Court more representative of Israeli society, the bulk of whose population more or less identifies with the Jewish heritage, which the Supreme Court frequently scorns.

Fourth, enforce Basic Law: The Knesset, which prohibits any party that negates the Jewish character of the State.

Fifth, enforce the 1952 Citizenship Law, which empowers the Minister of Interior to nullify the citizenship of any Israel national that commits "an act of disloyalty to the State."

Sixth, rescind large-family allowances, with the understanding that the Jewish Agency will assume the function of providing such allowances to Jewish families, while Arab philanthropic agencies may do the same for Arab families.

Seventh, put an end to the notorious tax evasion of Arab citizens and their countless violations of building and zoning laws.

Eighth, terminate subsidies to, or expel, Arab university students who call for Israel's destruction, and require Arab schools to include Jewish studies in their curriculum.

Ninth, amend the "grandfather clause" of the Law of Return to limit the influx of gentiles into Israel.

Tenth, enfranchise Israelis living abroad. This will increase the power of the Jewish vote.

Eleventh, phase out U.S. military aid to Israel (now less than 2% of the country's GDP), as well as American participation in Israel-Arab affairs. Both undermine Israel's material interests as well as Jewish national pride.

Twelfth, as Kemal Ataturk did in Turkey, terminate Arabic as an official language of the State and its (required) use in all official documents. This will negate the anti-Zionist idea that Israel is a bi-national state or that it should be a "state of its citizens."

This solution to the Arab demographic problem avoids two unrealistic alternatives. As already indicated, the expulsion of Israels Arab population is politically impossible, and the establishment of a Palestinian state is suicidal. On the other hand, no sensible policy can be based on the remote possibility that Arabs will soon forsake their 1,400-year autocratic tradition and become liberal democrats. The Arabs of Israel are intimately tied to the Arab world.

The problem is not to change them but to change Israel. Israeli institutions must be made more representative of the Jewish people, of their cherished beliefs and values of the. This will heighten Jewish national pride and deepen attachment to the Land of Israel - the key to prompting Arabs to emigrate from this country.

Prof Paul Eidelberg is President of the Foundation For Constitutional Democracy. He can be reached by mail at 244 Madison Avenue, Suite 427, New York, NY 10016, Tel: 212-372-3752, and by email at Constitution@usa.net