http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/143705‘Help the Bedouin Go Back Where They Came From’ Says Rabbi Lior
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
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Israel should help pay the Bedouin to move back where they came from – Libya and Saudi Arabia - said Kiryat Arba-Hevron Rabbi Dov Lior at the fourth annual Ramle Conference Tuesday.
"There is land available in Saudi Arabia and Libya. They have enough land. But if we leave them here, where they work against the People and State of Israel, there is no solution,” according to Rabbi Lior.
The Bedouin population in the Negev, aided by Israel’s relaxation of laws against polygamy in favor of Bedouins, has shot up from slightly more than 10,000 in 1948 to well over 125,000 today. Bedouin youth have traditionally served in the IDF until recent years, when increasingly larger numbers of potential soldiers have rejected volunteering for the army, preferring to cooperate with Hamas terrorists to steal and smuggle weapons and to attack Jews. A 10-year-old survey reported that 42 percent of the Bedouin reject Israel’s right to exist, and the number has grown since then.
Rabbi Lior said he favors a humanitarian solution by giving the Bedouin financial aid, unlike the government expulsion of Jews from Gush Katif in Gaza nearly five years ago. The expulsion victims sued the government through the High Court, which advised officials that the aid offered to them did not even come near to the sum that would satisfy the Basic Law’s designation of Human Rights and Dignity.
Rabbi Lior also rejected the idea of land swaps within the country. "Arabs [and Bedouin] are against the existence of Israel," he said. “Ownership of the land is part of the struggle. We have no fight with them. They are fighting with us.
This year’s Ramie Conference dealt with the problems of land ownership and management. Also participating were Tzfat Chief Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu, Beit El Yeshiva and Chief Rabbi Zalman Melamed, and Ramat Gan Chief Rabbi Yaakov Ariel.