About 1,000 Bedouin citizens protested Thursday in Beersheba against what they called the demolition and displacement policy of National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, following the demolition of two residential neighborhoods in Tel Arad and al-Sar over the previous two weeks. The demonstrators shouted slogans against Ben Gvir and, with police coordination, blocked Reger Street, the city’s main road, for several minutes.
The protests were triggered by recent demolitions affecting Bedouin families in the Negev. In Tel Arad, a neighborhood housing 40 households from the al-Nabari family was destroyed, and in the Bedouin village of al-Sar, 20 homes belonging to the al-Apshak family were demolished.
Talal al-Krenawi, the mayor of Rahat and chairman of the Forum of Arab Local Authorities, said Ben Gvir had warned that as many as 20,000 more homes could be demolished next year. He urged Arab voters to participate in elections, saying the Negev holds significant electoral power and that unity could change the situation. Jamal Zahalka, head of the Higher Arab Monitoring Committee, said the destroyed homes and confiscated lands belong to all Arabs, and argued that the state should choose dialogue and negotiation instead of unilateral demolitions and expropriations.
Nati Yefet, spokesman for the Council of Unrecognized Villages in the Negev, said residents are not opposed to regulation, but want the state to let them live legally and with dignity where they have lived for decades. He said the state has failed to prepare planning schemes or recognize the villages, adding, “They demolish homes for 1,000 families a year and regulate only about 40. This is not regulation, it is smoke and mirrors.” The council also accused the government of allowing illegal construction elsewhere while demolishing Bedouin homes, claiming about 700 homes were demolished in the past year and about 2,500 over three years, with fewer than 100 families legalized. The Bedouin Development and Settlement Authority rejected the criticism, saying it is promoting two major plans, including new infrastructure plots and a “leveling up” program for ownership claims, and called on the Bedouin public to accept the state’s offer for regulation and development.
