أثر الحركة الاحتجاجية في إسرائيل 2011-2012
Date
2015-06-15
Authors
محمود فخري نمر حسونة
mahmoud fahkry nimer hassouneh
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
AL-Quds University
جامعة القدس
جامعة القدس
Abstract
The subject of the research subject deals with the importance of the mass 2011-2012 social
protest movement in the streets and squares of Israel's cities, its timing, its situation and its
effect. The protests started with the demand for social justice after the Israeli successive
governments neglected the social services as a result of the neo-liberal and economic
policy.
The research aimed at identifying the Israeli social protests during 2011-2012 and the
extent of success for these protests.
The researcher used the qualitative analytical method and the content analysis research
tools applied mainly on Hebrew resources.
The research aimed at answering the following:
How did the Israeli public response to the protests movement?
The extent of the participation of political parties in the protests movement.
How did the Israeli government react and face those protests?
The research provides the reader with an insight into the social movement in Israel and its
effect dividing it into chapters and subjects. The study included five chapters. Each chapter
was divided into a number of inter-related subjects that draw a rounded view of the protest
movement in Israel.
The research includes the study of the background, the theoretical frame, idioms, and the
factors that led to the protests in the squares. In addition, it views the effect of the protests
movement on the parliamentary elections, the security dimension, the extent of response
that was adopted by the Israeli governments and finally it reviews the developments that
emerged from the social protests.
The research came to conclusion that the Zionist political dimension played big role in
preventing the protest leaders from contact and building bridges in regard to the mutual
demands with the Palestinian in Israel such as cost of living, taxes and housing. Knesset
member Itzik Shmuli (one of the social protest leaders who later joined the Labor party)
said that the Palestinian who live in Israel would not participate in the protests unless they
raise national emblems and under the umbrella of the national struggle which is refused by
the Zionist protesters.
Moreover, the research suggests that the protests leaders weren’t interested in building
bridges of trust with the Palestinian or with the leaders of the "Arab Spring". Thus, Itzik
Shmuli, one of the leaders of the protest movement in Israel, responding to a questionnaire,
did not accept that the movement was affected by the revolutions of the "Arab Spring". In
the opinion of the researcher, Shmuli's response reflects the absence of the bridges of trust
as a result of the political dimension and Zionist racism. On the other hand, the Israeli
protest movement leaders discovered that it was not the cost of “cottage” cheese nor the
cost of living and housing which hinder achieving their demands, but rather the
government and its security budget of which the Israeli citizen paid in favor of occupation
and settlement through the direct and the indirect taxes which left negative impact on the
social services.
It is evidently clear that the 2011-2012 social protest movement in Israel impacted the
subsequent 2013 elections, with Yair Lapid adopting the protesters demands, capitalizing
on the corrosion of the middle class, whose vote gained him 19 seats in the 19th Knesset.
Lapid and his Party (Yesh 'Atid) lost much voters and seats when they disappointed and
turned their back to the protesters’ demands, and so, he gained 11 seats in the subsequent
2015 elections for the 20th Knesset. Consequently, there was a negative view towards
political parties as a whole which created mistrust of the public. In Dr Aziz Haydar's view
the negative attitude towards parties came to the surface because the contact channels
between the public and their representatives was lost. To conclude, the Israeli social
protests wouldn’t fulfill recovery in the social welfare unless Israel discards the occupation
practices.
Description
Keywords
الدراسات الاقليمية , Regional Studies