Negev Coexistence Forum for Civil Equality
פורום דו-קיום בנגב לשוויון אזרחי
منتدى التعايش السلمي في النقب من أجل المساواة المدنية

NCF in the Media 2014

Negev Bedouin are now demolishing their own homes out of despair, +972 Magazine, 26 December 2014

According to the Negev Coexistence Forum for Civil Equality’s report on home demolitions in the Negev, 78 percent of home demolitions in the Negev are carried out by homeowners, rather than the state. The report shows how the authorities invest resources and put immense pressure in order to increase the number of self-demolitions.

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Can a cybersecurity center bloom in Israel’s Negev?, Jewish Journal, 18 December 2014

The Negev Coexistence Forum, the Israeli NGO that facilitated the Journal’s interviews in Lakiya, has been documenting the gradual reduction of Bedouin lands. In an article on the military’s expanding southern presence, the organization’s director, Haia Noach, opined that because the government couldn’t find civilian incentives strong enough to develop the Negev, it had “abandoned most of it to the army and the Ministry of Defense.”

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Israeli plan to build houses for Bedouin gains traction, Haaretz, 9 December 2014

Despite the state’s efforts to bolster recognized Bedouin villages, over the last year the state demolished 859 buildings in the Negev, of which 54 percent were in recognized Bedouin villages and only 46 percent in unrecognized ones, according to a report by the Negev Coexistence Forum for Civil Equality.

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NGOs petition Supreme Court to protect Beduin from rockets, The Jerusalem Post, 18 July 2014

CEO of the Negev Coexistence Forum Haia Noach told The Jerusalem Post in an interview on Thursday that “the role of the state is to protect its citizens.” The Negev Coexistence Forum is one of the NGOs that has been seeking for years to have shelters built in Beduin villages in the Negev. Noach said that her organization has sent a number of letters to the Israeli Home Front Command – going back to Operation Cast Lead in 2008. However, the letters did not receive a response. Asked what the Beduin plan on doing now, Noach responded, “pray to Allah and hope rockets do not fall on them.”

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Petition calls for bomb shelters for Bedouins, i24NEWS, 18 July 2014

“The role of the state is to protect its citizens,” Negev Coexistence Forum CEO Haia Noach told the Jerusalem Post. The Negev Coexistence Forum has been petitioning for years to have bomb shelters built in Bedouin communities. The organization has sent dozens of letters to the Home Front Command regarding the situation without receiving a response.

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Report: 75,000 Bedouin in Negev have limited or no running water, Haaretz, 6 July 2014

The report, published by the Negev Coexistence Forum for Civil Equality, also finds that the state has rejected almost all the Bedouin requests to connect their villages to the national water system. Also, the Health Ministry fails to supervise the quality of the water, the report notes.

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The Negev Desert’s Vanishing Bedouin, The Daily Beast, 16 June 2014

Many people in Rahat are on unemployment benefits as a result, said Aisha Ziadna, a student in the city who works as international coordinator for the Negev Coexistence Forum for Civil Equality, also known as Dukium. The 1000 NIS (about $280) per month provided through the welfare system is “not very much,” said Ziadna. “It doesn’t do anything.”

But Ziadna points out that when people have been displaced from the agricultural lifestyle of the villages and moved into Rahat and the other towns, they generally don’t have the skills or education necessary to get jobs even when they’re available.

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Bedouins defiant despite Israel eviction plan, Al-Jazeera, 14 June 2014

Israeli police had been regularly visiting the cemetery since March, taking photographs and measurements, said Haia Noach, director of Dukium, an Israeli organisation campaigning for equal rights for the Negev’s Bedouin.

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Israeli authorities ‘try to evict dead people’ from Arab village, The Independent, 28 May 2014

According to local charity the Negev Coexistence Forum for Civil Equality (NCF), residents found eight eviction orders in Al-Araqib’s cemetery on 21 May. Some of the orders were issued against people who were buried there, as well as for people no longer resident in the village. NCF campaigner Michal Rotem believes it was a mistake from outdated records. She said: “When residents told them they are dead, they wrote on the order ‘X claims that this man is dead’ and pasted it anyway on the old mosque in the cemetery. “We assume that they want to evict the people that live in the cemetery and their homes, not the graves.”

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