Ghazi Falah

Living Together Apart: Residential Segregation in Mixed Arab-Jewish Cities in Israel

This paper examines features of residential segregation in five mixed Arab-Jewish cities in Israel; the role of ideology and state politics among the charter group—i.e. the Jewish population—is considered to be a dominant factor in this social process. Utilising available Israeli census data supplemented by the authors own field survey, the study indicates that all five cities have experienced a continuous trend of high indices of segregation and hypersegregation. The spatial manifestation of this trend is a classic display of sectoral (but not concentric) patterns of residency. Concomitantly, the scope of both social and economic interactions between the two communities sharing the same urban space remains underdeveloped. The city has effectively provided a sense of local identity: both groups live in and are part of the same place, yet this space is not a locus for genuine integration. A situation of neighbours without neighbourly relations marks the residential reality of Israeli mixed cities.

The spatial manifestation of threat: Israelis and palestinians seek a ‘good’ border

Abstract Boundary studies in political geography have largely focused on the presentation of empirical case studies. There has been little development of a theory focusing on the multi-faceted nature of both spatial and group boundaries, and the interlinkages between them. An analysis of the boundary concept within the context of the Israeli-Arab conflict points to the importance of understanding both internal and external perceptions of threat. This is reflected in the dual political discourse of physical security and space purification, the former being used as a means of securing territorial boundaries, the latter in an attempt to obtain boundaries between competing national groups. Idealistic solutions to the Israeli-Arab conflict would result from an emphasis on human rights as an alternative to the traditional spatial discourse.

Co-existence in Selected Mixed Arab-Jewish Cities in Israel: By Choice or by Default?

In this paper, we use a data-set based on a survey of the perceptions about co-existence between Arabs and Jews as held by the inhabitants of five mixed Arab-Jewish cities in Israel: Acre, Haifa, Jaffa, Lydda and Ramla. Our main purpose is to determine the relative importance of various factors which contribute to the level of satisfaction with co-existence in Israel as perceived by the inhabitants themselves. Our choice of explanatory variables is motivated by a consideration of issues relating to the specific historical context of Jews and Arabs living together in these cities; and, an awareness of more general sociological considerations which may bear on the degree of satisfaction with co-existence. Our empirical analysis suggests that the variables relating to the specific historical evolution of Arab-Jewish relations-especially in the context of the urban setting-have the greatest explanatory power in understanding perceptions of co-existence. Basic sociological factors also hold some explanatory importance.