Throughout the 1990s Bashir worked in the Israeli settlement of Giva'at Zeev. On a clear day, while working as an electrician for the settlement's municipality, fixing streetlights and doing other repair jobs, he could see his home down the valley. There were several other Palestinians from the neighbouring West Bank villages who worked with Bashir as electricians, street cleaners or gardeners. Bashir also had several colleagues who were Israeli citizens and lived either in Giva'at Zeev or in nearby Jerusalem. In the mid-1990s, after he had been working for the municipality for several years, Bashir realised that he and his Palestinian colleagues were receiving considerably fewer benefits at work than their Israeli co-workers. His Palestinian colleagues were initially reluctant to take any action as they feared losing their jobs, which were relatively well paid by the standards of many Palestinians employed in the West Bank. Eventually, however, Bashir managed to persuade several people to join him and find out what they could do.

As Israeli and Palestinians live side by side in the West Bank, the distinction between their respective rights and entitlements is a crucial issue. This distinction has been formed at the juncture of two apparently contradictory processes. One the one hand, Israel is defined by law as a ‘Jewish state’ that seeks to promote the collective interests of ‘the Jewish people’.