Arab Society in Israel: Trends of Integration & Radicali...

The past few years have seen significant trends of pragmatic cooperation between Arab and Jewish leadership in Israel, particularly in efforts to advance economic integration of the Arab community. A notable example is the recent governmental Economic Development Plan for the Arab Sector, which was developed in full partnership with Arab leadership and hinges on Arab municipal and regional enforcement. Parallel to these developments, trends of socio-political radicalization have surfaced within Arab society in Israel, which are often attributed to escalations and political upheavals in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, as well as various Arab countries in the Middle East. Recent examples include isolated instances of Arab citizens’ participation in the spate of stabbing attacks in Israel, and the controversial opposition of Arab Joint List MKs to labelling Hezbollah a terrorist organization by Arab countries.

Dr. Yusri Khaizran of the Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace and Arik Rudnitzky of TAU’s Konrad Adenauer Program for Jewish-Arab Cooperation at the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies spoke to the Task Force audience about how these ostensibly opposing developments interrelate, inform, and contradict one another, and what might be at their core.

Join us for an insightful discussion.

Event Details:
Thursday, March 17th - 12:00pm ET

About the speakers

Dr. Yusri Khaizran is a fellow researcher at Hebrew University’s Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace. He has served as a lecturer for the Department of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies at the Hebrew University, as well as the Open University, and fulfilled post-doctoral fellowships at Brandeis University’s Crown Center for Middle Eastern Studies and the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University. Khaizran was the recipient of the Nathan Rotenstreich Scholarship for Outstanding Doctoral Candidates, and the Israeli Ministry of Science Scholarship for Outstanding non-Jewish Researchers, as well as the Fulbright grant for post-doctoral studies. In addition to publishing numerous peer-reviewed articles, Dr. Khaizran’s book The Druze Community and the Lebanese State: Between Confrontation and Reconciliation saw light in 2014 (London: Routledge).

Arik Rudnitzky serves as Project Manager and Junior Researcher at Tel Aviv University's Konrad Adenauer Program for Jewish-Arab Cooperation, at the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies. He holds MA (magna cum laude) and BA degrees in Middle Eastern History from the Faculty of Humanities and an MBA degree from the Faculty of Management, both at Tel Aviv University. Mr. Rudnitzky has been studying Israeli Arabs issues for more than a decade. His fields of expertise cover political, national and social developments in the Arab society in Israel, as well as government policies on Arabs in Israel.