The military face behind the Prawer Plan's civilian mask
Two quotes in the same newspaper, excerpts from interviews with two former military figures, 50 years apart. Both discuss the Bedouin in the Negev, and from both we can learn about the deeply ingrained relationship of the State of Israel to the most disenfranchised population in its territory. One is an interview with Moshe Dayan, former chief of staff, who became agriculture minister in Ben-Gurion’s government in 1959. The other is an interview with Doron Almog, a former chief officer of the Southern Command, who became head of the implementation team for resettling the Bedouin (the Prawer-Begin plan) in 2011, in Netanyahu’s government.
Moshe Dayan in an interview with Haaretz, July 31, 1963:
The Bedouin must become urban laborers – in industry, service, construction and agriculture. Eighty-eight percent of Israel’s residents are not farmers. The Bedouin will become part of that majority. While it is a sharp transition, it means the Bedouin will not live on his land with his flock, but rather will be part of the urban class that comes in the afternoon and puts on his slippers. His children will become accustomed to a father who wears pants, who doesn’t carry around a dagger nor is pulling lice out in public. They will go to school with their hair combed and parted. It will be a revolution, but it can be done over two generations. Not forcefully, but directed by the government. The reality known as ‘Bedouin’ will disappear.
Doron Almog in Haaretz, Dec 2, 2013
This is a very sensitive stage,” said Almog. “The Bedouin opponents [to the Prawer-Begin Plan – A. B.-A.] believe that every tin shed must be defended, not to preserve the Bedouin society, but rather to create territorial contiguity between Hebron and the Gaza Strip.
http://972mag.com/the-military-face-behind-the-prawer-plans-civilian-mask/83305/
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Dayan had IMO a typical early-mid 20th century colonialist attitude towards the Bedouin, and Almog he updates it with a security blanket 