Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-lj6df Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-06T08:02:11.023Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

When the State Fails to Provide Services: The Case of the Islamic Movement in Israel

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 December 2017

RANA ESEED*
Affiliation:
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, School of Social Work and Social Welfare, Mt Scopus, Jerusalem 91905, Israel email: [email protected]

Abstract

This study addresses the Islamic Movement in Israel. Hitherto studied almost exclusively from the political perspective, this article sheds light on its social roles as a provider of welfare services to the Palestinian population. It does so by analysing its unique Independent Community (IC) concept, which calls for self-reliance in welfare service provision. Despite its importance, the concept, which applies to all spheres of life and is relevant to other indigenous minorities, has received relatively little attention in the literature. The present study, which is part of the ‘religious turn’ in welfare state literature, addresses this gap by describing IC and its development, and by explaining how the concept developed in the context of the Palestinian population's social discrimination and exclusion.

Based on findings from various archival sources and interviews with movement leaders, the article concludes that the concept of IC is a response to discriminatory and exclusionary welfare policies. Together with the broader local and global process of welfare state retrenchment, this created a vacuum that proved fertile ground for the emergence of IC, calling for a reshaping of Israel's social policies and the role played by the welfare state vis-à-vis faith-based organizations that represent indigenous minorities.

Type
Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aburaiya, I. (2004), The 1996 split of the islamic movement in Israel: Between the holy text and Israeli-Palestinian context. International Journal of Politics, 6.Google Scholar
Adalah. (2011), The inequality report: The Palestinian Arab minority in Israel. Haifa, Israel: Adalah - The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel.Google Scholar
Adamson, F. (2006), Islam in Europe: The Challenges of Institutionalization. Council for European Studies at Columbia University.Google Scholar
Ali, N. (2004), Political Islam in an ethnic Jewish state: Historical evolution, contemporary challanges and future prospects. Holy Land Studies, 1, 6992.Google Scholar
Ali, N. (2007), The concept of independent community in Islamic movements. In Rekhess, E. (Ed.), The Arab minority in Israel and the 17th Knesset elections (pp. 100110). Tel Aviv: The Konrad Adenauer Program for Jewish-Arab Cooperation, Tel Aviv University. (Hebrew)Google Scholar
Ali, N. (2013), Between Ovadia and Abdallah: Islamic and Jewish fundamentalism in Israel. Tel Aviv: Resling. (Hebrew)Google Scholar
Banting, K., Johnston, R., Kymlicka, W. and Soroka, S. (2006), Do multiculturalism policies erode the welfare state? An empirical analysis. In Banting, K. and Kymlicka, W. (Eds.), Multiculturalism and the welfare state (pp. 4992). New York: Oxford Universty Press.Google Scholar
Cammett, M. (2014), Compassionate communalism: Welfare and sectarianism in Lebnon. New York: Cornell Universty Press.Google Scholar
Clark, J. A. (2004), Islam, charity and activism: Middle-class networks and social welfare in Egypt, Jorden, and Yemen. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Cnaan, R. (1985), Racial differenced in social service delivery: Jews and non-Jews in Israel. Social Development Issues, 10, 5674.Google Scholar
Cnaan, R., Boddie, S., Handy, F., Yancey, G. and Schneider, R. (2002), The invisible caring hand: American congregations and the provision of welfare. New York: New York University Press.Google Scholar
Coser, L. (1956), The functions of social conflict. New York: The Free Prees.Google Scholar
Coser, L. (1967), Continuities in the study of social conflict. New York: The Free Prees.Google Scholar
Dixon, J. E. and Scheurell, R. P. (1995), Introdction: Social welfare of the indigenous peoples within the United States of America. In Dixon, J. E. and Scheurell, R. P. (Eds.), Social welfare with indigenous peoples (pp. ixxiii). New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Doron, G. (1996), Two civil societies and one state: Jews and Arabs in the State of Israel. In Norton, A. R. (Ed.), Civil society in the Middle East (pp. 193220). Leiden: Brill.Google Scholar
Gidron, B., Bar., M. and Katz, H. (2004), The Israeli third sector: Between welfare state and civil society. New York: Plenum.Google Scholar
Endeweld, M., Barkali, N., Gottlieb, D. and Heller, O. (2016), Poverty and social gaps report: Poverty and social gaps in 2015. Jerusalem: Israel Central Bureau of Statistics.Google Scholar
Göçmen, I. (2013), The role of faith-based organizations in social welfare systems: A comparison of France, Germany, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, 42 (3), 495516.Google Scholar
Gladwin, M. (1994), The theory and politics of contemporary social movements. Politics, 14 (2), 5965.Google Scholar
Haidar, A (ed). (2010), The equality index of Jewish and Arab citizens in Israel. Jerusalem: Sikkuy.Google Scholar
Holler, R. (2014), Disability and employment policy in the Israeli welfare state: between exclusion and inclusion. Disability & Society, 29 (9), 13691382.Google Scholar
Hollinger, D. (1995), Postethnic America. Beyond Multiculturalism. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Ibrahim, M. (1990), The Islamic Movement in Israel. Givat Haviva, Israel: The Institution of Arabs studies. (Hebrew)Google Scholar
Interview with Raed Salah. (2002a), The 48' Palestinians and the Interdependent community. Retrieved from https://www.paldf.net/forum/showthread.php?t=3686Google Scholar
Interview with Raed Salah. (2002b), The Islamic Network interviews Sheikh Raed Salah. Retrieved from http://articles.islamweb.net/media/index.php?page=article&lang=A&id=5077Google Scholar
Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics. (2016), The annual data. Jerusalem: Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics.Google Scholar
Jamal, A. (2017), Arab civil society in Israel: New elites, social capital and oppositional consciousness. Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad Press. (Hebrew)Google Scholar
Jawad, R. (2009), Social welfare and religion in the Middle East: A Lebanese perspective. Bristol: The Policy Press.Google Scholar
Karmer, J. (1995), Social welfare of the indigenous peoples within the United States of America. In Dixon, J. E. and Scheurell, R. P. (Eds.). Social welfare with indigenous peoples (pp. 5497). New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Kymlicka, W. (1995), Multicultural Citizenship: A Liberal Theory of Minority Rights. Oxford: Clarendon.Google Scholar
Meho, L. I. and Haas, S. W. (2001), Information-seeking behaviour and use of social science faculty studying stateless nations: A case study. Library and Information Science Research, 23, 525.Google Scholar
Ministry of Social Welfare. (2006), Review of social services. Jerusalem: Senior Division for Research, Planning and Training.Google Scholar
Mustafa, M. (2013), Political participation of the Islamic Movement in Israel. In Rekhess, E. and Rudnitzky, A. (Eds.), Muslim minorities in non-Muslim majority countries: The Isalmic Movement in Israel as a test case (pp. 95115), Tel Aviv: The Konrad Adenauer Program for Jewish- Arab Cooperation, Tel Aviv University.Google Scholar
Patel, L., Kaseke, E. and Midgley, J. (2012), Indigenous welfare and community-based social development: Lessons from African innovations. Journal of Community Practice, 20 (1-2), 1231.Google Scholar
Payes, S. (2003), Palestinian NGOs in Israel: A campaign for civic equality in a non-civic state. Israel Studies, 8, 6090.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Payes, S. (2005), Palestinian NGOs in Israel: The politics of civil society. London/New York: Tauris.Google Scholar
Paz, R. (1989), The Islamic Movement in Israel after the municipal elections. Tel Aviv: Moshe Dayan Institute. (Hebrew)Google Scholar
Peled, A. R. (2001), Towards autonomy? The Islamist Movement's quest for control of Islamic institutions in Israel, The Middle East Journal, 55 (3), 378398.Google Scholar
Quadango, J. (1994), The color of welfare. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Rosenhek, Z. (1999), The exclusionary logic of the welfare state: Palestinian citizens in the Israeli welfare state. International Sociology, 14 (2), 195215.Google Scholar
Rosenhek, Z. (2002), Social policy and nationbuilding: The dynamics of the Israeli welfare state. Journal of Societal & Social Policy, 1 (1), 1531.Google Scholar
Rosenhek, Z. and Shalev, M. (2000), The contradictions of Palestinian citizenship in Israel: Inclusion and exclusion in the Israeli welfare state. In Butenschon, N. A.., Davis, U.. and Hassassian, M. (Eds). Citizenship and the state in the Middle East: Approaches and applications (pp. 288315). Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press.Google Scholar
Rosmer, T. (2012), Resisting “Israelization”: The Islamic Movement in Israel and the realization of Islamization, Palestinization and Arabization. Journal of Islamic Studies, 23 (3), 325358.Google Scholar
Roy, S. (2011), Hamas and the civil society: Engaging the Islamist social sector. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Wickham, C. R. (2003), Mobilizing Islam: Religion, activism and political change in Egypt. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Weisbrod, B. (1988), The nonprofit economy. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Weisbrod, B. (1998), To profit or not to profit: The commercial transformation of the nonprofit sector. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wiktorowicz, Q. (2004), Introduction: Islamic activism and social movement theory. In Wiktorowicz, Q (Ed.), Islamic activism: A social movement theory approach (pp. 112142). Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Yishai, Y. (1998), Civil society in transition: Interest politics in Israel. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 555, 147162.Google Scholar