Author visits Bloomington to discuss Arab discrimination, prejudice in Israel

Author Susan Nathan spoke to an audience of about 30 Thursday night at the Monroe County Public Library to share the prejudices Arab people in Israel face, which she documents in her book, "The Other Side of Israel: My Journey Across the Jewish/Arab Divide." The IU Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures co-sponsored the event.\n"How can people of very different kinds of traditions and ambitions occupy the same geographical space?" Nathan asked. "(Israel) is the most unequal state in all of the Western world. The country is putting people in denial of their basic human civil rights, externally and internally."\nNathan, who's originally from England, now lives in the northern Israeli town of Tamra, where she's the lone Jewish person living among about 30,000 Palestinians. She used this town to document Arab inequality in Israel. \nTamra lacks a fire department and is forced to use emergency workers from Jewish neighboring towns. This means for the 30,000 people there is only one ambulance on call. \nNathan also spoke of the inequities in the school systems.\n"There are no state-funded kindergartens for Arab schools, and despite the heat, there are no air conditioners in Arab schools," she said. "There are no resources for any lessons, and there is no funding going to them."\nNathan said Tamra and its 30,000 residents live on 1,000 acres of land while their neighboring Jewish towns have 600 people but with three times the land.\nNathan said "The Other Side of Israel" exposes the inequalities Arabs face, but it is merely an overview of what is happening in her country.\n"Every area of abuse is so appalling it deserves lectures of its own. I tried to get them all into this book," Nathan said.\nWhen asked what would be the best solution to solving the problems in her country, Nathan suggested that an equality commission be put into place but emphasized that such a commission might not be enough and that violent behavior is looming.\n"I see the situation getting worse and not better. Nobody takes (commissions) seriously. What they take seriously is an uprising," Nathan said. "Violence is the only language that speaks in my country"