Government Imposes "Khawwa" on Arabs

"Khawwa" is a Turkish word meaning tax collection, which over time has shifted in meaning to denote the imposition of a levy or tax by force.

The Netanyahu-Gvir government has decided to charge Arabs a "Khawwa" by deducting approximately 220 million shekels from the budgets allocated to the Arab community under the five-year plan that started in 2016 and redirecting it to the Israel Security Agency (Shabak), under the pretext of enhancing its capabilities to combat organized crime, which is experiencing unprecedented levels within Arab towns. Since the beginning of this year, around 250 murders have been recorded, while the rate of solving and prosecuting these crimes stands at only 14% according to 2024 data, meaning only one in six crimes is solved, leaving the rest unresolved and unpunished!

In 2024, there were 220 murders in the Arab community, compared to 58 crimes in the Jewish community. Indictments were filed for 65% of the crimes in the Jewish community versus only 14% of crimes in the Arab community.

The financial transfer raises questions about its political implications, whether it constitutes actual support for security efforts, or if it redefines the development plan from its roots. Since the launch of the first plan in 2016, it was seen as a step toward closing historical gaps stemming from decades of neglect and discrimination in education, infrastructure, employment, and social services, with one of its aims being to address the causes of violence and crime.

The current redirection of budgets from civilian projects to a security apparatus represents a shift in priorities and alters the plan's course from addressing the social and economic roots of violence to merely confronting its security outcomes. In other words, the civil tools established to close the gaps are now being replaced by security tools that implicitly assume the problem lies with a community that requires surveillance, rather than a cumulative reality of institutional neglect. It is worth noting that police leaders have stated since 2021 that part of the murderers are Shabak agents, which impedes the revelation of the perpetrators.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu defended the decision, asserting that violence in the Arab community has become "intolerable," and that Arab citizens "committed to the law" have the right to feel secure, considering the redirection of funds a logical step from the lesser important to the more important. However, this justification raises the question of why new budgets for combating crime were not added instead of withdrawing resources already designated to close structural gaps. The true reason for this deduction is primarily racism, as part of a funding plan for the genocide war in Gaza that has cost tens of billions.

This decision parallels previous governmental steps where economic resources were used as a political pressure tool, similar to the deduction of a portion of the clearance funds belonging to the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah, under the pretext that these funds are paid to the families of martyrs and prisoners.

Confronting organized crime cannot be achieved through security measures alone, but requires a deeper address to the phenomenon's sources, starting from poverty, through the absence of youth frameworks, ending with the weakness of local authorities and the lack of economic prospects, with the most severe aspect being the systematic policy of constriction in construction and expanding spaces.

In this sense, this transfer reduces the developmental path in favor of a security path that has no guarantees for success in the long term. It also raises fears that the reductions in the five-year plan budgets, which represented a cornerstone for bridging the vast gap, have become less stable and more susceptible to cuts or delays under security or political pretexts.

There are no data indicating that this decision will lead to a decrease in crime, while it will lead to the erosion of the developmental structure of the Arab community at a time when it needs more investment in services, infrastructure, and opportunities, rather than their reduction, which falls under a policy of constricting Arabs at its core.

Thus, the current financial deduction surpasses mere technical steps, that is, transferring the budget from one goal to another, but reveals a deeper shift in the hostile policy toward the Arab community, from acknowledging the need to close structural gaps to reproducing a security approach that overshadows the civil and developmental aspects, in a context where public trust in the state's ability to protect its citizens and fulfill its commitments is declining. In fact, the government is acting like a gang demanding khawwa: "Pay for your protection, or we will let crime gangs continue to wreak havoc upon you."