In May, the Israeli legislative body, known as the Knesset, passed the nation-state bill in its first round, which redefines how Israel is to be a Jewish and democratic state. The bill will serve as something of a constitution, since Israel does not have one. It will also formalize the state’s relationship to its Palestinian-Arab minority.
If it becomes law, the bill would establish Hebrew as the national language of Israel, and in effect eliminate Arabic as an official language.
Some fear that doing so would also threaten to deny the history of Arabs in the state.
Linguistic legacies of 1948
Today, about 20 percent of Israeli citizens are Palestinian Arabs who remained in Israel after it was established in 1948. As I discuss in my book “The Politics of Arabic in Israel,” Arabic has been an official language in Israel since 1922, when a law was passed during the British rule over Palestine (1918-1947). After the establishment of Israel, the law continued to exist.
Read the full article by Camelia Sulieman at The Conversation.