Designed to be Jewish, Israeli universities make no space for non-Jews to have a life in them, asserts Dr. Riad Agrabia, chairman of the Department of Clinical Pharmacology at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. By way of example, Agrabia pointed out that despite the fact that Arabic is an official language of the country and that over twenty percent of the citizens are Arabs, all campus signs are in Hebrew – down to the name on his office door. The problem, said the Palestinian citizen of Israel, is more than cosmetic, “If you don’t see your language or culture on the campus, you feel like a stranger.”
In this sense Agrabia, who is from Umm al Fahm, a major Israeli Palestinian town in the north of Israel, has been a stranger for the past 25 years. In 1980 he matriculated at BGU for his first degree, then continued on for his second and third. He was then invited to continue his research on AIDS and cancer drugs as a faculty member. Upon accepting the position, he set to work increasing Arab enrollment and enhancing Arab students’ experience at the university. At the time, there were four or five Arab students in the eight departments of the Health and Sciences division.
Based on his experience as a student and as new faculty, Agrabia decided the best course of action would be to help prepare Arab students for enrollment. Approximately 30 percent of the non-Bedouin Arab students at BGU either drop out of school or change their majors due to a process of self-selection, and there is no specific support group or office to attend to their needs. Coming from a place with little cultural emphasis on the liberal arts, most choose career-oriented fields, such as education or science, in order to acquire relatively quantifiable skills. These are also, said Ibrahim Hijazi, a current MA student in psychology, fields that are less likely to discriminate against Arabs. Unlike, for instance, nuclear engineering.
Indeed, like other Israeli institutions, the office of the Dean of Students is purportedly there for everyone, but preference for scholarships and dorm placement is given to those who served in the Israeli army, which, needless to say, not many Palestinian Israelis do. The problems that these students face include an array of disadvantages based on language, social, cultural and economic gaps. “In everything,” Agrabia said, “We’re level B compared to the Jews – land, education and infrastructure.”
Hijazi, a self-described Palestinian, Arab, Muslim student from Tamra, a town in Israel, described his experiences at Haifa University and now, at BGU, as being two-fold. First, he said, the fact that all instruction, faculty, and administrative correspondence is conducted in Hebrew has meant that although it excludes his communities, he had “to use this level to succeed in [his] dream.” From a very early age, he said, he “saw [his] future through the university.” But he feels no deeper emotional connection to his work because of the linguistic, cultural and social differences.
“I can not separate between the university and the government. Both are based on the Zionist consensus,” Hijazi said. Describing himself as a realist, he understands that his country was founded at the expense of his own people’s wartime loss. And, as a resident of the country, he understands that the majority’s victory is celebrated on the same day that his loss is commemorated. However, he said, “If the university as a multi-cultural place, as they say, then it must contain all the narratives of the groups learning there.” And the university, like the state, refuses to make this inclusion. As such, the only place he feels comfortable is in his activities in the Arab student organization al-Qalam, “The Pen.”
Al-Qalam’s main focus is to improve the social, emotional, economic and academic environment for Arab students by “empowering” them. Even though the members are dues-paying members of the Student Union, the group receives no university funding. Many Arab students, afraid future employees might be suspicious of Arab cultural activities, are scared to participate because the university keeps records of the group’s programs. Because of this concern, Hijazi noted, one of the group’s main goals is to make sure Arab and Bedouin students are not afraid. He is undeterred in his mission. Ultimately, he said, “as Arab students, we have the responsibility to demand such things.”
Agrabia would likely agree. The high school enrichment program he founded is changing the situation from the ground up. Whereas the first classes he taught had no Arab students in them, and there were only five Arab women and 75 Arab men at the whole university, there are today 1000 Arab students out of a total of 16,000—most of whom are women. Furthermore, where he used to be the only one, there are now fifteen Arab faculty members—but out of a total of 450. There is certainly more work to be done.
