How regional tensions affect the Israeli state’s interaction with the Arab minority living in its midst has been a major theme of this book. Yet, external geo-strategic factors are by no means the only factors that influence the state and the predominant community’s outlook and behavior toward Israel’s Arab citizens. The positions these citizens take regarding the external challenges and crises Israel faces also plays a role influencing the Israeli state and the predominantly Jewish population. This chapter analyzes the positions Israel’s Arab political elite took in six cases involving relations between Israel, the Palestinians across the Green Line, and other regional actors over the past two decades. The cases covered include:

1. Iraq’s occupation of Kuwait on August 1, 1990, up to 2001

2. Israel’s policies in Lebanon during the 1990s until the final withdrawal in 2000

3. Reactions among the Israeli Arab public and elite over the Israeli–Jordanian peace treaty signed in October 1994 in Wadi Araba near the Gulf of Akaba

4. The position Israeli Arabs took toward the intensive struggle waged mainly by professional unions in states such as Egypt and Jordan that signed formal peace treaties against the “normalization” of relations (muqawamat al-tatbi‘) between Israel and Arab states and their respective societies (Ozacky-Lazar and Ghanem 1991: 3)

5. The relationship between the Palestinian NGOs and the state as it was reflected in the international conference that took place in Durban in August 2001

6. Israeli Arabs and The Israeli–Hizbullah War

Israeli Arabs and the Gulf War – 1990–1991

For Jewish Israelis, the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in August 1990, the Allied Coalition buildup in anticipation of the air and land war over a period of more than six months, and Saddam Hussein’s threats to strike at Israel and his subsequent launching of missiles over a period of three weeks terrified Israel’s Jewish citizens to an extent paralleled only by the buildup before the 1967 war. Fearing missiles with biological or chemical war heads, tens of thousands of Israelis fled the Tel-Aviv area to temporarily reside in safer areas in Israel’s periphery. Facing a common threat, Jewish Israelis were unanimous in their condemnation of Iraq, and the support for the Iraqi leader that was evinced in countless demonstrations of support in the Arab world. Indicative of this short-lived political unanimity was Yossi Sarid’s by now legendary remark to the Palestinians, “let them look for me when they need me” at the sight of seeing on television screens Palestinians on Gaza roof tops dancing for joy after the barrage (Lavie 2002; London 1996). Sarid was Israel’s most prominent left-wing politician, the chairman of the Meretz Party, and long-time champion of the Palestinian right to statehood.