Dismantling government investments in Israeli Arab society

The Jerusalem Post

 

April 20, 2026

 

Dismantling government investments in Israeli Arab society

 

By Kenneth Bandler

 

“It is forbidden to harm the essential multiyear plan, whose contributions to education and welfare in Arab society is truly existential,” Israeli President Isaac Herzog declared at the annual Givat Haviva Shared Society Conference in January.

 

The president was referring to determined efforts led by Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, and Women’s Advancement Minister May Golan to slash official budgets for improving the daily lives of Arab citizens, who comprise 21% of Israel’s population.

 

This ominous campaign to dismantle essential governmental investments in Arab citizens is especially frustrating for Hassan Towafra. He was the last person to head The Authority for Economic Development of the Arab Community (AEDA), the principal government office responsible for uplifting Arab citizens to reduce disparities and advance the integration of Arab citizens into Israel’s economy and broader society.

 

“The main challenge for the Authority [AEDA] is the current government,” Towafra told me when we met in New York the day after he delivered the keynote address to the Task Force on Arab Citizens of Israel’s annual meeting last November. He guided the development and implementation of Government Resolution 550, the second five-year national plan investing in and empowering the country’s Arab minority.

 

“Israel cannot truly prosper without the full inclusion of its Arab citizens with equal rights, quality education, strong municipalities, and meaningful employment opportunities. When we achieve this, it is not only the Arab community that will thrive, it is Israel as a whole,” Towafra told more than 130 members of the Task Force, the main US organization engaging American Jews with Israel’s Arab citizens.

 

Created in 2007, AEDA was purposely located in the prime minister’s office. Showing his own promise to close longstanding disparities between Jewish and Arab citizens, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu supported the adoption in 2015 of Government Resolution 922, the first official commitment to improve the lot of Arab citizens. It’s NIS 10 b. budget yielded substantial gains in education, housing, public transportation, and infrastructure for Arabs throughout Israel.

 

Towafra became AEDA’s second director in October 2020. He was transitioning from a senior government position toward the private sector at the time, but the birth of his first daughter, the same week that a call for applications to head AEDA was published, led him to change course. He realized then that he wanted to be directly involved in continuing the expansion of cooperative relations between Israel’s Arab citizens and the government.

 

His tenure coincided with a particularly challenging period in Israel. “We had a big crisis every year. COVID, Guardians of the Walls, 2022 political polarization, judicial reform, October 7, and war for two years,” Towafra recalls. Still, he led the development, approval, and implementation of Government Resolution 550, totaling NIS 30 b., the largest government investment in Arab society since Israel’s founding.

 

The Netanyahu-led coalition government’s approach to Jewish-Arab relations in Israel today, however, is a striking reversal of the groundbreaking leadership in addressing inequities between Jewish and Arab citizens when AEDA began operating, and Netanyahu backed Government Resolution 922.

 

Budget cuts to Resolution 550

 

In late 2024, 15% of the budget from Resolution 550, approximately NIS 2.5 b., was slashed, and a second cut occurred in 2025, totaling NIS 280 m., of which NIS 220 m. was redirected to the Ministry of National Security, ostensibly for the police to deal with the crime and violence crisis afflicting Arab communities, even though the ministry’s budget and a separate government resolution, 549, provides ample resources to tackle this crisis that has claimed the lives of more than 80 Arab citizens since January 1.

 

While May Golan’s ministry has overseen AEDA since 2015, she has been a willing ally of Ben-Gvir and Smotrich in their ongoing efforts to dismantle what’s left of the original 550 budget. Yet, despite the cuts to date, AEDA still has NIS 3.5 b. to expend before the current five-year plan ends on December 31.

 

“People do not realize the consequences of stopping government investments in Arab society,” Towafra points out. “The government only a decade ago began addressing the gaps between Arab and Jewish society, and we already are making real changes in education, employment, transportation, infrastructure, and local economic development.”

 

Towafra emphasizes that “the contribution to the Israeli economy is immense, with estimates that the integration of Israeli society has added tens of billions of shekels annually to the GDP.”

 

While the AEDA head position has remained vacant since Towafra stepped down in June 2025, he expressed confidence when we met last month that AEDA staff will complete the current five-year plan by the end of the year.

 

Despite the many domestic and external challenges Israelis face, Towafra projects perpetual hopefulness. He expects Israeli political and civil society leaders to mobilize to produce the next five-year plan, especially if a new coalition government is formed after elections later this year.

 

“Investing in employment, in education, in infrastructure in Arab society is not a left or right, conservative or liberal issue,” he says. Government investments in Arab society are a sound policy that will strengthen Jewish-Arab relations and a shared society in Israel.

 

“We have to be optimistic,” says Towafra.

 

The writer is the media relations adviser for Friends of Givat Haviva. He served as the American Jewish Committee’s director of media relations, 1998-2023.

 

Israel’s Arab investment plan faces cuts amid political tensions | The Jerusalem Post