Chapter 2 Creation of the Military Regime

The Aftermath of the Arab-Israeli War and the Formation of the Military Administration

The Arab-Israeli war ended in victory for Israel, but the fledgling state could not rest on its laurels. Having suffered thousands of casualties and massive destruction, Israel was in dire need of investments. With the heavy influx of Holocaust survivors, including those released from the British camps in Cyprus, and a multitude of Jewish refugees who fled from Arab lands and usually arrived without resources, the state was compelled to adopt food rationing and other austerity measures (see fig. 2.1).

The state needed every piece of arable land from which food could be produced in the western Negev. To provide waves of immigrants with accommodations, it had to build numerous absorption centers or transit camps (ma’abarot) to shelter the Jewish immigrants (olim). Conditions were extremely harsh, and it was years before the olim could be moved from their tents or tin huts and the ma’abarot could at last be dismantled.7

Meanwhile, Israel continued to face security challenges due to the reluctance of the Arabs to concede Israel’s victory. Along the Israeli frontier and border regions, life was under constant threat from fedayeen and other infiltrators.8

For the local Arabs, the outcome was even worse. Their leadership had fled, and they too had suffered many casualties and extensive destruction to their settlements. Most of the Bedouin became refugees, prohibited from returning to their former homes, unlike the friendly Bedouin tribes who were allowed back. Arabs who had never left or had been allowed to return were placed under the jurisdiction of the military administration declared by the Provisional Government in 1948. The military administration was based on the British Defense (Emergency) Regulations of 1945, which were incorporated into Israeli legislation.9

These regulations granted extensive powers to restrict freedom of movement and other rights such as due process. Its stated rationale was that Arabs in Israel who did not accept the sovereignty of the new state or participate in its society were liable to engage in fifth-column activities. Another security issue was the infiltration of Arab refugees and fedayeen.10 In 1950, the military administration formed a system of supervision and control over three main areas inhabited by Arabs and Bedouin tribes: the Galilee in the north, the Middle in the easternmost boundaries of the central district, and the Negev in the south, each headed by a military governor. Map 2.1 shows the military administration zones as of February 28, 1951.

Although the governors operated under the same formal framework and received their instructions from headquarters, they were granted broad discretion in determining their own policies (see fig. 2.2).11

In addition to security concerns, the military administration was responsible for the everyday life of the inhabitants of the restricted zones under its jurisdiction.12 Although many of the needed resources were provided by other ministries, they were supervised and coordinated by the military administration. Education and health services and even food supplies were dispensed in proximity to military administration agencies.13 In addition, the military administration controlled the permits in and out of its zones and was empowered to approve or reject work permits, formally the task of the labor office.14 While acting within the same official framework, the precise nature and effect of the military administration on individuals subordinated to it were largely determined by the governor of each zone.

Among other authorities involved in the lives of the Arabs, the most active ones with regard to the Negev Bedouin during the period under discussion were the IDF Southern Command, the intelligence units of the Israeli Security Agency, the prime minister’s adviser for Arab affairs, the Ministry of Agriculture, and, as of 1950, the Development Authority.15

The Bedouin as Individual Farmers on Moshavim

As for the standing of the Negev, Israel was successful in its military control of the region and even extended its borders beyond the Partition Plan, notwithstanding several disturbing issues. Egypt, hoping to regain a hold in the Negev, encouraged the constant looting, smuggling, and infiltration of an ever-growing number of fedayeen.16 The Jewish population of the Negev was in dire social and economic straits after months of intense attacks and battles with hostile forces. Some of the Jewish settlements were completely destroyed, and several, including Beit Eshel, Alumim, and Ramat Negev, were permanently abandoned.17

The situation of the Negev Bedouin tribes was also extremely difficult. The time had come to discuss a settlement policy for the several thousand Bedouin who remained in place and those that Israel allowed to return.18

In late January 1949, Yigal Allon, operational commander of the Southern Command; Asa’el Zuckerman, military governor of Migdal Gad;19 Michael Hanegbi, military governor of the Negev; and other officers together with Weitz, who was highly involved in settlement issues, arrived at an understanding that it would be prudent to move the Bedouin eastward.20 Although reasons for this decision were not given, we may surmise that it was intended to distance the Bedouin from the borders with Egypt and Gaza, which were a source of unrest. The Egyptians continued to lay territorial claim to the Negev while soliciting Bedouin tribes to provide them with intelligence on IDF movements. Moreover, the Bedouin hid infiltrators and fedayeen in their encampments. In addition, certain lands used inefficiently by the Bedouin, particularly in the western areas, were suitable for intensive cultivation and sorely needed for food production. Land was also necessary for development and for the settlement of olim so as to ensure Israeli rule in the Negev.21

According to available documentation, the first comprehensive deliberations over the future of Bedouin settlement were conducted within the Committee for Refugee Affairs. This state-level committee was launched after the war at Weitz’s initiative to address Arab refugee issues. He was joined in this task by Zalman Lif, adviser on land issues at the Prime Minister’s Office, and Ezra Danin, adviser on Arab affairs at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who submitted several joint reports to Ben-Gurion on abandoned properties and their legal status and proposed the establishment of a development authority to administrate them. In September and October 1949, the committee held three meetings with several invited officials including Hanegbi in attendance, to discuss Negev Bedouin concerns.

The two main proposals brought forth by Hanegbi and Weitz concerned the future of the Negev Bedouin after the war and in times to come. Both proposals included privileges resembling those granted to the Israeli agricultural cooperatives, the moshavim, with individually owned farms, each with a plot of land of fixed size. According to data provided by Hanegbi, the Bedouin numbered about 3,500 families, 16,000 to 18,000 people in all, temporarily settled within three confederations—the Tarabin in the western Negev between two kibbutzim, Hatzerim and Tze’elim; the ʽAzazmah, south of Be’er Sheva between Halutza and Alumim; and the Tiyahas, spread over an area of half a million dunams in the northeastern Negev around Khuweilfah, Shoval, and Nevatim. Hanegbi explained that some of these Bedouin were infiltrators, that their locations were temporary, and that they had already been moved several times.22

During the discussion, Hanegbi and Weitz presented two basically similar options for their declared aims: settling Bedouin communities in different locations as agricultural villages. Hanegbi suggested establishing twelve to fifteen of these with some 230 to 300 villagers in each, all in the western Negev, near the water pipeline and surrounded by Jewish settlements. According to this plan, each family would be allotted a farm unit, which would include a house, arable land, equipment, and water rights for irrigating crops. The size of each unit would not exceed three hundred dunams, in accordance with its soil quality and specific location.23

Underlying Hanegbi’s proposal was the notion that the Bedouin had no ownership rights to the land, as evident from his statement that “among the Bedouin there is no sooner or later in terms of rights as in the Galilee and plans can be carried out in stages.”24 According to the prevailing land laws, it was possible, in time and under certain conditions, for possessors to gain ownership rights of Miri lands, as was the case in the Galilee region. Hanegbi was of the opinion that the lands in the Negev were not Miri lands and therefore could not be subject to these rules.25

The other proposal, made by Weitz, was that an estimated 500 Bedouin families would refuse to live in permanent villages and hence would leave Israel. Ten villages would be located east of Be’er Sheva, in an area covering 600,000 dunams of arable land, each village accommodating 250 families. Out of these families, 200 would be involved in cultivation and receive about 300 dunams each, and the remaining 50 would work in services. In addition, four or five smaller villages would be developed in the western Negev, each accommodating about a hundred families who would all receive five dunams of irrigated land.26

Weitz justified the proposed location by arguing that the eastern Negev is mountainous and therefore difficult to irrigate and unsuitable for the “self-indulgent Jews” who had so deeply disappointed him by abandoning their Negev settlements. Three months earlier, in a discussion with Allon, the latter noted the necessity to establish new Jewish settlements in the Negev, and Weitz commented, “Salt you sow on my wounds! And where are the people? Where are the soldiers who willingly agree to settle in the Negev?”27

It should also be noted that the eastern Negev was the area in which most of the Bedouin had remained during the war and where the majority of them lived at the time.

Both proposals aimed to transform the Bedouin from pastoral nomads into members of settled communities of nuclear families working in agriculture. Hanegbi envisioned their full transition to a livelihood that would be based, like that of the fellahin, solely on irrigated crops. Weitz adhered in principle to Hanegbi’s proposal but for practical reasons consented to allow them some measure of pasturing. This displeased Hanegbi, who feared it would jeopardize the desired social and economic changes and noted that “moving them [the Bedouin] to a mountainous area, without water and connection would mean leaving them in their current state without a systematic solution.”28 Nevertheless, he added, “It would be impossible just to order the Bedouin to live in settlements.”29 In his view, a policy that involved confrontations with the Bedouin was simply unfeasible.

The abovementioned meeting was the last documented occasion in which Hanegbi argued in favor of individualization and permanent settlements for the Bedouin. From then on, and throughout most of his term as military governor, he promoted a policy of tribal frameworks for the Bedouin as opposed to their reorganization as village fellahin.

The committee met again a few times and determined a process of land allocation to the Bedouin through the submission of individual forms, which followed the previous understanding that lands would not be distributed in the western Negev.30 While the second part of this decision was later implemented, the first part was not.31 The idea of individual applications was utterly new to the Bedouin, to whom land had always been granted collectively via their sheikhs. Individual Bedouin who had never been in direct contact with the authorities as well as their sheikhs were not pleased with the idea either.32 Such allocations were supposed to be carried out jointly by the Negev Military Administration and local representatives of the Ministry of Agriculture. However, the locals found reasons to postpone the full implementation of individual allocations by raising technical obstacles. Whether these reasons were genuine or not, the outcome was that the bulk of the landholdings continued to be allocated via the sheikhs.33

Another issue that was formally determined at a state level was landownership. Lif, a committee member, when asked by the custodian of absentee property why he had not been included in the process of allocating Negev lands, answered that the government’s position on the Bedouin did not comprehend their ownership rights:

The government sees the entirety of all the Negev land as state land for which no one—including Bedouin who lived there—has or had the right of possession to the land. . . .

The Mandate Government as well did not recognize this possession as ascribing to the holder’s ownership of the type of ‘Miri’. . . .

There is no support for the notion that the land was granted to them by the Ottoman regime according to law and therefore they did not and do not belong to them. Even if here and there facts of possession were created, they are not sufficient to detract from ownership by the government to which and only to which belongs the land in this region.34

In an inquiry conducted by Hanegbi, the Bedouin sheikhs had claimed ownership of about half a million dunams of land, 40 percent of them in areas they were not allowed to cultivate. Hanegbi added his opinion that such claims were exaggerated and surely included absentee property.35 Lif’s position, like Hanegbi’s earlier statement, contradicted the Bedouin perception of landownership. However, there is no indication that Hanegbi took active measures to enforce state ownership rights in the years that followed.

The Military Administration in the Negev

As we have seen, local and state-level decision-makers agreed in 1949 that the Bedouin would be settled as cultivators of state lands and rejected their claims to private ownership. No subsequent state-level discussions were held, however, and no resources of any kind were allocated to promote the implementation of this policy. The only prominent nonmilitary figure who expressed interest in Bedouin settlements was Weitz of the JNF. Although highly influential, Weitz was not a member of the government, and his efforts were unproductive. As he noted in his diary, discussions about the Bedouin “go on and on and lead nowhere.”36 By the end of 1949, no government guidance had been given to frame a comprehensive Bedouin policy. It was left to Hanegbi to determine an appropriate way of administering the Bedouin. For this mission, he received only a few officers and very limited resources.37

In January 1950, at a coordinating meeting, Hanegbi shared his view that the temporality and lack of a clear aim with regard to the Bedouin was “a difficult problem in terms of the stabilization of rule in the region.”38

The Negev Military Administration held agencies in several locations: Tel Malhata (Tall al-Malih) for the tribes of the east, mainly the Dhullam subconfederation; one in Umm Batin for nearby tribes, including Abu Rgayyig; one near Shoval, mainly for the al-Huzayyils; and a southern one for the ʽAzazmah and Tarabin tribes.39 Map 2.2 presents the agencies of the Negev Military Administration and indicates the locations of tribal centers, where the tents of the sheikhs were located.

Hanegbi framed his policy according to three main dimensions: the territorial dimension—that is, the creation of a territory restricted to Bedouin tribes; the social dimension, through the formation of eighteen so-called “tribal units,” each headed by an authorized sheikh; and the legal dimension, using tribal courts to settle disputes and minor offenses according to Bedouin norms. I shall discuss these gradually developed dimensions in a chronological context.

The Formation of Tribal Units and Their Leadership

The war had left some tribes as functioning entities and others with a very small base of people. Though tribalism was alien to the Israeli system, the Negev Military Administration found it expedient either to organize all the remaining Bedouin as multi-tribal units or to annex them to other tribes. Archival documents attest that some Bedouin clans asked to become affiliated with specific tribes or to change their affiliation.48

For these groups, the term tribe was artificial and somewhat misleading, since they were not related by blood or intrinsic affiliation. However, the definition had become a procedural component of the Negev Military Administration, and they were referred to as such in all documentation. The term tribe was used as the main designation in all Bedouin documents including identity cards and formal addresses. In 1951, the authorities recognized the existence of eighteen such tribes in this manner.49

Each tribal unit, whether original or not, was headed by a sheikh, generally one who had remained in the country during the war; if a former sheikh had departed, a new, lower-ranking sheikh was appointed in his place.50 A sheikh had to be approved by the Negev Military Administration, from whom he derived his authority.

According to the sociologist and anthropologist Emanuel Marx, the Negev Military Administration easily adapted to the traditional tribal framework and refrained from interfering in the Bedouin’s choice of a new sheikh in the belief that tribal dynamics would lead to the selection of the most acceptable person.51 Hence, in cases when a sheikh died, the Negev Military Administration preferred to go along with the choice of the tribe. Marx explained further that the Bedouin found this a useful, less restrictive arrangement since they could leave it to their sheikhs to negotiate with the Negev Military Administration and carry out their oral instructions to the best of their understanding.52 Sometimes a tribe would request a different choice, as when the al-‘Ugbi tribe asked the military governor to replace their sheikh, who was known to be involved in unlawful activities.53

On May 2, 1950, an important event took place at the encampment of Sheikh al-Huzayyil, attended by Chief of Staff Yigael Yadin along with Commander of the Southern Command Moshe Dayan and others, and several sheikhs from the Tiyaha confederation. The sheikhs welcomed them all with great ceremony and declared their loyalty and willingness to protect Israel against the surrounding Arab states (see photos from the events in figs. 2.3 and 2.4). The sheikhs then petitioned for the right to maintain their tribal traditions, referring to the rights they had received under the mandate and requesting a fixed salary according to the number of their respective tribe members,54 thus joining the appeal twelve Bedouin sheikhs had submitted a few days earlier.55

Indeed, the sheikhs were gradually given extensive powers and privileges as well as duties and responsibilities for all tribal members and territories deployed by the tribe. The sheikhs were charged with the distribution of allocated lands, food rationing in times of austerity and drought, franchising tribal markets, registering birth and death records, granting documents necessary for the acquisition of entry and exit permits, and handling employment lists. They were the sole address for their tribesmen’s mail and were likewise charged with maintaining the peace, reporting crimes, and surrendering suspects.56 An example of these duties was a call issued by the Negev Military Administration on October 11, 1951 to the sheikhs of the Dhullam subconfederation “to order all those in their tribes without IDs to leave the country within a week,” otherwise “they would be personally considered responsible for accommodating infiltrators.”57 The sheikhs were issued formal seals and were permitted to bear arms (see fig. 2.5).

The position of the sheikhs with the Negev Military Administration, as historical geographer Joseph Ben-David explains, was mutually beneficial to the Bedouin, who needed help in mediating interactions with the authorities. Most Bedouin did not speak Hebrew and had no experience with Israeli bureaucracy. Some were also illiterate. The sheikhs became advocates with the power to obtain relief and assistance from the military administration.58

Tribal Court

Another mechanism officially authorized by the Negev Military Administration was the Bedouin Court, referred to generally as tribal court. Bedouin tribal courts had gained authorization under the British Mandate to settle disputes and implement tribal norms.59 The Negev Military Administration saw fit to continue the work of tribal courts under the auspices of the military governor. In 1951, several tribal courts in the region were operational, but Negev Military Administration officers decided to limit them to a single tribal court at the Umm Batin agency. The rotational bench of Bedouin judges was established with the approval of the governor and one Negev Military Administration representative.60 Tribal court powers were limited. They could impose fines and up to three months of imprisonment. Because there were no prisons in the area, most sentencing ended with fines and conciliations. Hanegbi reported that “the Bedouin fears and respects more the Bedouin court [tribal court] than the Magistrate court.”61

However, the tribal courts lacked true legal jurisdiction.62 It was not until 1955 that the Ministry of Justice formally approved their existence, and this was only as a result of mounting pressure. This reluctance was due to the fact that even though the tribal court was limited in scope, it implemented tribal norms as a binding system, not only in civil matters but also in cases of minor criminal offenses, without due process and with no clear appeal jurisdiction. Such a system contradicted the basis of the liberal democratic state.63

When it served the Negev Military Administration’s purposes, other aspects of tribal relations came into play, such as the use of local tribes as a barrier against hostile tribes that infiltrated mainly near the Israeli-Egypt border, and to a lesser extent the Sayig region of the eastern Negev.64

In March 1954, a terrorist group led by a Bedouin of the ʽAzazmah who infiltrated from Jordan attacked a bus in Ma’ale Akrabim in the Negev, killing eleven passengers and injuring five more. The Bedouin were prevented from free entry to the Be’er Sheva market for several months after the attack. An appeal to the UN for sanctions against Jordan was rejected. The attack was linked to a group called the Black Hand, dominated by Bedouin from the ʽAzazmah and Tarabin tribes near the Israeli-Egypt border, mainly in the Auja demilitarized zone, who engaged in hostilities against Israelis and Bedouin and other Arabs suspected of being Israeli informants.65

Visionary Agrarian Reform

Although the Negev Military Administration accommodated tribalism at the local level, bureaucrats at the state level declared the opposite in the press and in Knesset committees. An article from June 1953, published in the Mapai-related newspaper Davar, called for a change in the organizational framework of the Bedouin and the curtailment of the power of the sheikhs in order to “free the tribes from feudal control.”66 The article also claimed that once the Bedouin were settled and received a fixed allotment of land for each family unit, they would become free and independent farmers working in irrigated agriculture.67 It further alleged that while the sheikhs shouted that the Bedouin were “dying of hunger,” they amassed vast quantities of seed in their warehouses, which found their way to the black market.68 Another article in Davar some months later was titled “Sheikh Exploits His Tribe.”69 The sense of exploitation is evident in this verse recorded from an oral Bedouin poem:

The goatherd’s future is surrender / You spend your nights without sleep.

Much trouble in your search for grazing / Woe unto you if you do not find water today.

On Saturday the sheikh will come to you / And you will have to slip him some cash right away.70

In June 1954, during a Knesset committee discussion about absentee property, Reuven Aloni, head of the Land Department in the Ministry of Agriculture, called for the abolition of the tribal system within a comprehensive agrarian reform, with the following rationale:

In the Negev, unfortunately, persisting [among the Bedouin] the system of the sheikhs, who get a specific percentage of the crops. We are going to change that system and stop their Bedouin [way of life], and in this way protect the rights of the Bedouin farmer. If we will succeed in allotting land [directly?] to the Bedouin, and the Ministry of Agriculture helps them with the distribution of seed etc., by that the Bedouin will be released from his dependence on the sheikh. I hope that this problem will be resolved. It is clear that this cannot be achieved immediately, as the recognition of their rights is a very difficult problem.71

Furthermore, Mordechai Shatner, the custodian of absentee property and director of the Development Authority, gave a speech in 1954 pointing out the advantages of the newly passed Land Acquisition Law (Validation of Acts and Compensation 5713–1953).72 He noted that this legislation would promote agrarian reform for the thirteen thousand Bedouin of the Negev and enable their settlement in new villages with sufficient land and water for their livelihood.73

The Intelligence Division of the IDF, which probably received its information from local officers in the Negev Military Administration, did not consider these statements applicable. An Intelligence booklet issued in 1954 explained that the Bedouin had no special desire for permanent settlement, quoting an illustrative Bedouin proverb: “Allah be praised for fellahin who become Bedouin but not for Bedouin who become fellahin.”74

The differences between the Negev Military Administration and those who associated with state-level officials grew even more pronounced when Yoav Zuckerman became involved in Bedouin issues. Zuckerman, a land expert, had previous dealings with the Bedouin in the course of his work as a JNF agent in the Negev. He was appointed by Shatner to a subcommittee of three to help finalize Bedouin land issues within the Land Acquisition Law.75 The other two members were Svardalov from the Ministry of Agriculture and Joshua Verbin, who had been appointed military governor of the Negev in 1953. The subcommittee’s role was broad: to offer advice on land rights, compensation, permanent settlement of the Bedouin, housing, and water “if the tribes themselves wish it.”76 Zuckerman started to conduct a survey and collect claims from Bedouin all over the Negev, not merely in the areas expropriated in the Land Acquisition Law.77 Disagreements and confrontations soon arose between Verbin and Zuckerman. Zuckerman understood the subcommittee’s mandate as a means of linking the solution of landownership with a permanent settlement. Verbin was displeased with Zuckerman’s interpretation.

Their first major clash occurred when Verbin demanded the limitation of Bedouin land grants to the B2 area. Zuckerman objected. Their relations further deteriorated during the months that followed. Verbin claimed that Zuckerman’s activities interfered with the work of the Negev Military Administration and wrote a formal letter criticizing Zuckerman for his failure to coordinate, thus “creating obstacles.”78 Another clash occurred in November 1954, when Zuckerman convened a meeting to discuss the planning of a model Bedouin village. As far as he was concerned, planning of this kind was an integral part of their mandate. However, Verbin completely opposed the initiative and argued that Zuckerman had no authorization to deal with the matter.79

The need to decide on land policy was brought to the tables of Shatner and Aloni. At a meeting with the subcommittee in January 1955, Zuckerman complained that without clear instructions he could not promote negotiations with the Bedouin. Aloni and Shatner backed him in this and the linkage between landownership claims and permanent Bedouin settlements. Aloni said that during five years of regression, “each tribe has taken over and possessed certain areas. Even within the tribes there is no just distribution.” Shatner explained that in terms of Bedouin settlement issues they would be willing to revise and reduce the proof required according to the Acquisition Law.80 It was decided to let Zuckerman continue with his collection of Bedouin claims.

And indeed, Zuckerman continued his work, and at the next meeting with Shatner and Aloni he provided full details of all the Bedouin claims he had collected. This included 558 claims to an area of some 300,000 dunams.81 He repeated his request to determine the terms of compensation for each Bedouin family, without which he could not promote the negotiations.82 Shatner backed his request and stressed the importance of determining “the right of every individual and not just the tribe as a whole.”83 Aloni also backed him and suggested a compensation formula.84 Nevertheless, the matter of Bedouin claims was not finalized.

Although the subcommittee continued to meet in 1955, according to Verbin, their work lacked “any practical content” and did not operate along “right and effective lines.”85 Soon after, Zuckerman quit the subcommittee and never returned to work on the matter.86

Sheikhs Becoming a Source of Concern

In the fall of 1956, the 1950 decision to lease land directly to the tribesmen had not been fully implemented, and lands were still allocated via the sheikhs, who were allowed to sign contracts on behalf of their tribesmen.87 After Zukerman’s withdrawal, the Negev Military Administration continued to operate via the sheikhs with minimal interference from civilian bureaucrats.

The new subcommittee members were less antagonistic toward the Negev Military Administration and agreed they should restrict their work to the expropriated lands according to the Acquisition Law.88 However, two circumstances were causes of concern for the pro-tribal policy of the Negev Military Administration: the Ratner Committee and the security crises that preceded the Sinai Campaign.

By the end of 1955, the future of the military administration in Israel was in doubt. Left-wing parties argued in the press and at the Knesset that the military administration should be terminated for practical as well as moral reasons: it promoted hatred and detachment from the state among the Arabs, and it went against Israeli commitments and values as a liberal and democratic state.89 These claims were not new, but due to political coalition considerations, Ben-Gurion now agreed to nominate a committee of civilians to evaluate the legitimacy of maintaining the military administration.90 The committee was headed by Yohanan Ratner, a professor of architecture at the Technion and previously a high-profile member of the Hagana and the retired head of the planning department at the IDF General Staff. The Ratner Committee heard testimonies from some ninety Bedouin, military administration employees, and members of the public.

Verbin was among those who testified. He stressed the crucial need to maintain the military administration and detailed the security risks to the Negev from infiltration, espionage, and collaboration with the enemy. Only the military administration, he argued, had the capacity to provide the kind of coordination needed to handle these issues. He calculated the amount of manpower that would be required for this, laid out the complexities involved, and discussed the characteristics of “Bedouin mentality.”91 The Bedouin had no wish to change their way of life, he explained, and traditionally held centralized governments in contempt. Meir Amit, deputy head of the military administration, also testified. When asked about regulating the power of the sheikhs, Amit agreed that notwithstanding socialist considerations and the justness of allotting land directly to cultivators rather than via sheikhs, the existing system allowed for more control and supervision of the tribes.92

The Ratner committee meeting took place at a time when the security situation in the Negev was going from bad to worse. Secret talks between Egypt and Israel had recently failed, and Egypt still opposed Israeli control of the Negev and, in 1955, gained the support of the United States and Great Britain.93 During the second half of 1955, the Egyptians initiated a growing number of border incidents and sent fedayeen into the country on sabotage and asset recruiting missions. To combat more fedayeen attacks, Israel established Unit 101, headed by Ariel Sharon, tasked with “reprisal operations.”94 The reprisal policy, however, did not prove helpful in halting the deterioration in the security situation.

Some of the Bedouin allied themselves with Egypt, and a report from December 1955 indicated that enemy spies, terrorists, and foreign intelligence personnel were assisted by tribesmen who provided them with training, guidance, information, supplies, and shelter.95 Another report from January 1956 indicated that the “Bedouin have very close contact with the enemy”96 and that the phenomenon of “contact with the enemy for espionage purposes is very worrying because of its wide-ranging dimensions. Many members of the tribe assist the spies both in carrying out their work and in providing information of various sorts and protecting them from the patrols of [Israeli] security forces.” The report noted several instances of Bedouin convicted of espionage in 1955 and referred to the problem of blood ties, as in the case of the two nephews of Sheikh Salman a-Shteywi Abu Blal of the Abu Blal tribe, who both were involved in sabotage missions for the Egyptians.97

In February 1956, the Ratner committee confirmed the need to maintain the military administration for reasons of state security, although it acknowledged that in certain cases the military administration had proved injurious and discriminatory.98 The Ratner report says nothing about the Bedouin per se but approved the continuance of the Negev Military Administration policy.

Early in 1956, Pinhas Amir replaced Verbin as military governor of the Negev. Soon after his appointment, the sheikhs raised their call for ownership rights and, in May 1956, addressed the public through the press and in the Knesset, blaming the government for not granting them landownership rights.99 One cause of the tension was a dispute between the Development Authority and Sheikh Salamah Sager al-Huzayyil over a vast amount of land he had presumably cultivated without permission.100

In October, Sverdalov of the Ministry of Agriculture, who was put in charge of land leases, announced that “all lands in the Negev over which there is no proof of ownership, shall be considered state land,” and until the Bedouin proved ownership, they would have to lease the lands.101 In response, Sheikh Salman al-Huzayyil announced that the Bedouin refused to lease land they owned themselves and demanded that the government implement a process through which they would be able to prove their ownership.102 The ongoing landownership issue created discord between the Negev Military Administration and the sheikhs. The issue was under the jurisdiction of different governmental agencies, so the military administration could not make it disappear entirely, but it did play a role in postponing an inevitable confrontation.

As the security situation worsened, the actions of the sheikhs were further scrutinized. Marx described a “new class of sheikhs” who “socialize together and share their interest.”103 The growing power of the sheikhs made its way to the press. In July and August, a series of articles on the Bedouin appeared under the caption “The Bedouin—A Rich Minority in Israel.” One of the articles included an interview with Sheikh ‘Ali [Salman] Abu Grenat, who declared that the Bedouin were reluctant to accept state plans that would force them to live a settled life like Jews and Arab fellahin.104

The troubling activities of the sheikhs were most clearly described by Sasson Bar-Zvi, then a high-ranking officer in the Negev Military Administration who later became its governor: “The sheikhs by virtue of their powers have managed to concentrate within their hands most of the key positions in the area.”105 Theirs were the “safest, richest and largest smuggling and infiltration centers in the Negev” through which all major smuggling routes had to pass. In addition, they had become well-known “professional collaborators” with both Israeli and enemy intelligence. They had learned not to overtly assist Israel or to provide valuable information. They controlled the economy and trade as well as contact with the authorities. They had unsupervised control over the distribution of land and food rations. And last, they managed to circumvent almost all competitors and opponents.

Bar-Zvi did not suggest abolishing the tribal system, only using it more wisely, in a way that would diminish the power of the sheikhs while expanding the supervision and control of the Negev Military Administration. Years later, Bar-Zvi explained in an interview that the Bedouin could not “be controlled in any conceivable way without acting through the traditional tribal structure, namely, the head of the tribe and the heads of the factions.”106 His practical suggestion was to promote the growing desire within Bedouin subtribes and groups to seek independence from traditional tribal leadership, a desire he linked to the influence of the surrounding Jewish population. Hence, the Negev Military Administration should grant heads of groups within the larger tribal structures an independent status. Indeed, this method of creating splits within the larger tribes to achieve desired goals was later used several times.107

By the end of 1956, the Negev Military Administration retained Bar-Zvi’s co-tribal policy as far as possible. The security issues in the Negev were resolved only through the Sinai Campaign (October 29–November 5, 1956), during which Israel took over the Sinai Peninsula; several months later, Israel withdrew under US pressure.108

Discussion and Conclusions

During the early years of the state, two contradictory approaches to tribalism were followed. One was motivated by social democratic principles and modern liberal agendas that aimed to transform the Bedouin into a community of individual fellahin in order to free them from the constraints of tribalism, including their subordination to sheikhs who tended to exploit them. The other approach favored a kind of indirect rule, a policy that sidestepped Bedouin individualism and cooperated with tribalism while embracing alliance with the sheikhs.

Initially the vision of the Bedouin becoming fellahin seemed a matter of consensus. Though Hanegbi had advocated for this together with Weitz, once he found himself face to face with reality, his views inclined toward pro-tribalism. The need to control a region and its population lacking in resources, with only a small number of officers and no clear-cut policy vis-à-vis Bedouin settlement, made pro-tribalism crucial.

As governor, Hanegbi acted to implement in full the advantages the tribal social system had to offer. First, he made it operational again, after the turbulence of the war. This included a restructuring of tribal units and leadership since some of the Bedouin tribes had split up. Then he gave formal standing to tribal norms and adopted the Tribal Court as an operational legal system.

Although the decision to assemble the Bedouin in the Sayig area was dictated to him, Hanegbi was resourceful enough to negotiate the move with the sheikhs rather than with individuals. Formal incentives were granted to the tribes as a unit, but the Negev Military Administration did not supervise the sheikhs. Tribesmen who relocated to new areas became more dependent on their sheikhs.

Once the social reorganization was finalized, the tribal units and their sheikhs functioned sufficiently well as administrative units, each in designated tribal territory. The system enabled the Negev Military Administration to rule while keeping the region in a relative state of calm, at least for most of the period. Hanegbi’s successors carried on the same policy and successfully banned any involvement by civilians and bureaucrats in Bedouin issues.

Cooperation with tribalism became so intrinsic that even as the sheikhs grew in power to such an extent that they posed a threat to the ability of the Negev Military Administration to fulfill its mission and provide security to the region, the idea of abolishing the policy was never discussed. Instead, it was decided to use the tribal system in another way.

Thus, largely due to national prioritization, the military administration evaded the program to delimit tribalism and counteract the interests of the sheikhs by freeing the Bedouin from subjugation, settling them as individual fellahin, and instituting a formal land policy. Because Israel faced challenges in areas far more critical to decision-makers at the time, Bedouin issues were low on the agenda and tribal norms were reinforced at the expense of human rights like individual freedom and equality. Democratic values had been put on hold for all Israeli Arabs, and the fact that a relatively small group of Bedouin in the distant Negev were continuing their traditional way of life did not seem to require urgent intervention.

As we shall see in the following chapter, changes in the dominant policy were imposed on the Negev Military Administration as a result of external events, especially the harsh drought that drove the Bedouin in large numbers to the center of Israel.