Reda Jaber
Lawyer and Researcher specializing in law and public policy
Crises, wars, and revolutions are often revealing of the evils, violence, and darkness within the human soul. They also expose relationships, structures, and social and political systems that were hidden behind thick walls of collective narratives. These narratives present the positive face of the self while concealing the negative, using complex psychological techniques that are deployed both consciously and unconsciously. Over time, these techniques and their outcomes transform into culture or an image; anyone attempting to unveil them is deemed an outsider, in conflict with the group. During crises, these walls fail to withstand the eruption of the inner volcano, which seeks to express its repressed self in search of legitimacy and acceptance, something that the everyday image of the self had long prevented despite its existence and implicit expression (the Arab revolutions are a prime example).
The Palestinians, particularly in Israel, are well aware of this phenomenon in the Israeli context—an instance of contradiction between the idealized image of the Israeli self (even the internal criticism that once fascinated us but still remains within an Israeli framework and serves their interests) and the reality, which involves internal currents embedded in the state’s life cycle, its institutions, and its majority. This reality is built on a perspective of racial superiority and thus the state becomes an instrument for achieving this superiority. It also views the other (us) as lesser, a view that results in racism and hatred, translating into policies directed against us.
The war on Gaza, along with the accompanying interactions within Israel (state apparatus and society), acts as the volcano that has shattered the walls between appearance and reality within the Israeli context. The reality today is legitimized within a hysterical drift of hostility and hatred, stripping away the humanity of the Palestinian other. This situation has direct consequences for the status of Palestinians within Israel and how its institutions, social, and political structures treat this group and its members. Perhaps the law enforcement institutions and their individuals, standing at the frontline of direct contact with the Palestinian minority, are the most affected and influential in translating this reality into daily practices.
How Do We Read the Law Enforcement File Regarding Palestinians in Israel?
Today, law enforcement operates within two main frameworks: the first, which implements the policy of the majority as embodied in the state’s approach towards Arabs. Within this framework, law enforcement acts in accordance with both the state’s publicly declared programs and policies, as well as more subtle, underlying policies that define the state’s relationship with Arabs. The latter guides law enforcement institutions and individuals without written texts or clear instructions. Instead, it is embedded in the unconscious of both the institution and its personnel, carried out in reality without question. In the past, any attempt to critique this reality or reveal its connection to the increasing crime rates among Palestinians in Israel was met with rejection and direct accusations of hostility against the state and its institutions.
The second framework, closely linked to the first, gives it explicit legitimacy. In this framework, law enforcement and the police, in particular, are not merely seen as actors representing the majority, but as agents representing the right-wing and its agenda towards the Palestinian minority. The right-wing is not just political parties, but rather a set of ideas and directions that today enjoy near unanimous agreement when it comes to portraying Palestinians as a threat or potential enemies. In this framework, the balance that once maintained a superficial semblance of “professional” interaction between law enforcement institutions and Arabs is abandoned, revealing a new, overtly aggressive stance. This shift manifests in harsh police campaigns against Arabs, mass arrests for any political or moral expression deemed unacceptable from an Israeli perspective, the prevention of political expression through police force, the distribution of weapons within Jewish communities, and the messages accompanying these operations—all of which have definitively erased the apparent relationship with Arabs, replacing it with a legitimized and concealed reality.
The danger in this situation is that it is no longer a temporary phase that ends with the war that produced it. Instead, it has become a permanent state, one that permeates and becomes entrenched within institutions and their personnel, especially since the majority of individuals, particularly at the executive level, are aligned with the right and embrace its ideas and goals. The relationship between the institution and its personnel is reciprocal, and in the Israeli case, it is a relationship of adoption and construction. This means that it is not simply one side adopting a policy, but rather this interaction actively constructs these policies, which then become more than just the concern of policy-makers.
Furthermore, our struggle and engagement within Israeli politics to influence the work of law enforcement institutions has been primarily directed at its policies, based on the assumption that it operates rationally when dealing with us, even if this rationality ultimately serves its own interests. However, the new reality today is that our struggle begins from a point where the irrationality of the institution is clear, and this irrationality is aimed directly at us—its tendency toward racism, hatred, and exclusion. We are now faced with a new and more complex situation, necessitating a new form of engagement and confrontation.
