About the Follow-Up Committee: A Return to the Question of Origins

It has been four and a half decades since the establishment of the Higher Follow-Up Committee for Arab Citizens in Israel, since 1982. The 1970s represented a decade of major transformations in the lives of Arabs in the Palestinian territories, including the Land Day in 1976 and the political awareness it generated regarding the collective identity of Arabs, which necessitated the establishment of a high representative body to express their concerns and aspirations and to follow up on their affairs.

At that time, prior to the formation of the Follow-Up Committee, the National Committee of Arab Local Authorities, established in 1975, was considered the most prominent representative body. Following Land Day, it began to dominate the political scene in the territories, despite the fact that it was the committee that clashed with national forces by rejecting, with a large majority, the decision of the Committee to Defend Arab Lands to go on a general strike on March 30. That is to say, the National Committee of Local Authorities was one of the strongest opponents of the Land Day strike, while it was also one of the greatest beneficiaries of it. The National Committee underwent a transformation with the arrival of some mayors and local council heads representing active political parties in Arab society, along with a new class of young individuals who assumed the head positions of local councils in their villages, surpassing the traditional framework of leaders from the 1950s and 1960s, in light of the political momentum left by Land Day in the local scene.

However, the National Committee of Local Authorities was unable to serve as a comprehensive national representative body for Arabs in the territories for many reasons, the most important being that local authority is considered an extension of the Israeli institution due to its subordination to the Ministry of Interior, alongside the existence of local authority heads who were affiliated with Zionist Israeli parties, or a significant part of them reached their positions due to sectarian or familial sorting in their villages or towns. In addition, the nature of the agenda that continued to govern the logic of local governmental work contradicted many aspects of the national and collective aspirations of Arabs in the territories. Moreover, the Israeli institution was, in fact, the one that initially encouraged the establishment of the National Committee of Arab Local Authorities, through means involving some Arab mayors and councils. This created the need for an alternative representative body at the national level, thus the Follow-Up Committee was formed.

Since its establishment in 1982, the Follow-Up Committee expanded to include, in addition to the National Committee of Local Authorities, Arab Knesset members and members of the executive committee of the Arab Histadrut, forming a structure that established the first contradiction within the committee between a locally elected component, represented by the heads of local authorities, and other components whose members are elected through national political elections, such as Knesset members and members of the executive committee of the Histadrut, considering that Arab Knesset members are elected for the Knesset and not for the Follow-Up Committee itself. Nevertheless, the National Committee of Local Authorities remained the main central component that governed the rhythm of the Follow-Up Committee's decisions and pathways together.

According to Dr. Azmi Bishara in his book "The Arabs in Israel: A Vision from Within", upon its establishment, the Follow-Up Committee included in its structure the Zionist parties through their Arab representatives in the Knesset, emphasizing its "Arab-Israeli" character as nothing more than a coordination committee among all active political forces in Arab society and the local councils and municipalities. This means that local authority heads and Knesset members come to the Follow-Up Committee to coordinate and consult among themselves, rather than to organize the Arab minority within the territories.

Bishara adds to the contradictions of the Follow-Up Committee in its formation other shortcomings that represent flaws in its working mechanism, such as the lack of clarity in the organizational relationship between it and the Arab citizen that the committee is supposed to represent. Therefore, considering it a representative framework is a nationally assumed matter because its existence is better than its absence; however, it is not effectively substantiated. The other shortcoming is procedural, as the committee lacks a clear internal system that governs the decision-making process and how to follow up and implement it, despite being titled "the Follow-Up Committee".

What Bishara intended to convey regarding the contradictions in the essence of the Follow-Up Committee's establishment and structure is that no framework can be democratically representative and nationally inclusive unless it is directly elected by the citizens it is supposed to represent. This is a dilemma that has been and continues to be a core issue for the Follow-Up Committee and its representative role. However, some see that the direct election of the Follow-Up Committee by Arab citizens represents a challenge shrouded in a culture of separation from the Israeli institution, which does not recognize the Follow-Up Committee as a high representative body for Arabs, despite its dealings and coordination with it.

These were the contradictions of the Follow-Up Committee, and they still exist today, but they are now facing greater and more dangerous challenges than in previous decades. The Israeli institution is no longer what it was in the 1980s and 1990s, especially with the spread of fascist religious Zionism in the Israeli political landscape. The agenda of the institution is no longer necessarily filtered through Arab representatives in Zionist parties, to the extent that original Arab parties have recently adopted or recognized the reality of "the state’s Zionism". This, along with the continuous suffocation of the "political" practiced by the institution through its security apparatuses in the territories, restricts its scope to the degree conditional on its remaining within the frameworks and political horizons of Zionism.

Consequently, the role and performance of Arab representative frameworks, including the Follow-Up Committee, as well as non-parliamentary political forces and even parliamentary ones, have declined, as some face the threat of erasure and prohibition. In addition, the reality of the Arab community has become increasingly dire, with the rampant violence from criminal gangs and the spread of crime in recent years, rendering individuals and organizations on an unprecedented level of confusion and incapacitation. The Follow-Up Committee, stemming from its legitimacy and name alike, is the first to bear the responsibility of addressing the urgent questions of its community and its masses.

What hinders the Follow-Up Committee's mechanisms in addressing the affairs and great challenges of our community is embedded within it since its inception, regarding its functional structure and the nature of its composition, which continues to be plagued by contradictions of opposing agendas. Therefore, the election of a new head for the Follow-Up Committee next Saturday, in itself, is neither a solution nor a prescription for its crisis, but the new head must realize the scale of the contradictions within the committee he seeks to lead and the challenges facing the community he wishes to represent, which means he must open the door wide for work, starting from the committee itself.