Proud to be an Israeli Arab

CALL it ironic or emblematic of Israel’s open society that a top-rating commentator on Israeli television is an Arab woman who describes herself as a proud Israeli.

By calling the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as she sees it, Lucy Aharish has made enemies among the Arab-Israeli community, as well as out of some Jewish Israelis and overwhelmingly Palestinians, but she has also gained a legion of supporters.

The Channel Two broadcaster, who recently also worked on the i24 news channel, is visiting Australia for the United Israel Appeal to speak during its 2016 campaign.

Born in 1981 in Dimona, Aharish was five when she and her family were hurt in a terror attack in Gaza after two Molotov cocktail bombs were thrown at their car.

The Hebrew University graduate studied journalism in Tel Aviv and worked as an intern in Germany before becoming the first Arab news presenter on mainstream Israeli TV.

Speaking to The AJN, she admitted that at times, placing herself above the fray can be lonely and she has had death threats.

“I’m isolated from all sides … from the Israeli Arab community, I’m isolated from Palestinians … and also from the Israeli Jewish community,” she said.

Aharish said some in the Israeli Arab community “don’t appreciate the fact that I’m outspoken … and from the Jewish community, a lot of people from the extreme right don’t like the fact that I’m also a critic of Israel. I love Israel and I’m proud of this country, but when I see something wrong I don’t just stand aside.”

Her passionate condemnation of the latest terror upsurge went viral on YouTube. “When a terrorist enters a coffee house in Tel Aviv to shoot people, he ­doesn’t ask if they are Muslims, Christians or Jews, he just starts shooting,” she told The AJN.

As the only Muslim Arab student at her school in Dimona, she recalled that “returning to school the day after a terrorist attack, as a Muslim girl, that’s not something easy. Everything you hear is just ‘Arabs … we want them to die, we want to burn them.’”

In high school, she saw “filthy Arabs” and other hate graffiti on bathroom walls.

She is a critic of Palestinians’ indoctrination of their children to hate Jews and Israelis, but said Jewish Israelis need to increase their sensitivity to Arabs, bemoaning that “95 per cent of Israeli Arabs know Hebrew but only five per cent of Israeli Jews understand Arabic”.

Aharish sees “education on both sides” of the conflict as the only long-term circuit breaker. “The life experience I had does not allow you to be angry only on one side,” she pondered. “It’s allowing you to be angry on all sides that leads to understanding.”

PETER KOHN

Lucy Aharish is speaking at the UIA Women’s Division Breakfast on Thursday, February 25, at the International of Brighton. To book, call 1300 477 235.