Without any words I already knew you are an Arab ›

“…and I am still wondering if she thinks to herself that I will treat her better if she compliments the Arabs? Is that racism? Is that a superficial adaptation to social stereotypes? What is the meaning of this social perception in our lives here?” |Accomodation Raisonable (Cover for Canadian-Arab Women’s Magazine) By aMbiAncE mOushKiLa-cc: flickr

Aisha Sedawi ponders on the racism development in Israel. Through social stereotypes, she checks her being an Arab, and asks what is the meaning of this social perception on the Arabs and Jews lives in Israel. 

“G” is a Caucasian origin woman, who has been complaining to me for the past weeks about Amidar’s failure to fix the faults in the house.

On our first meeting she couldn’t tell I was Arab. When she talked about the clerk at Amidar she was telling me about how nice she was, and about the engineer who told her that there is no budget to fix her public housing apartment. “G” pointed out again the fact that he was an Arab. I wasn’t even trying to explain to her that the fact that he is Arab is not the problem; the problem is the dysfunctional system that doesn’t properly budget money for reparations. I wasn’t trying to explain that to her because of her difficulty to speak the Hebrew language, and also because it wouldn’t change the way I perceive Amidar to be responsible for the apartment that it gives to impoverished people and does not bother to repair them.

G came to speak to me today again, and I think this time she realized I was Arab. She hugged me and kissed me and said “the sweet Arab engineer told me that I am a kind woman and that he understands that I am right but there is no money”. G said, in poor Hebrew, that her son has Arab friends and that the Arab woman next door to her gave her from the food that her family brought. G left the office, and I am still wondering if she thinks to herself that I will treat her better if she compliments the Arabs? Is that racism? Is that a superficial adaptation to social stereotypes? What is the meaning of this social perception in our lives here?