Attorney General to Supreme Court: Education Ministry Commits to Appointing 9.5 Additional Counselors for Arab Bedouin Students in the Naqab At Risk of Dropping Out of School

During a hearing held in the Supreme Court of Israel on 8 September 2004 on a petition filed by Adalah in July 2003, the Ministry of Education (MOE) committed to appoint an additional five counselors for Arab Bedouin students in the Naqab (Negev) who are at risk of dropping out of school.

In its initial response to the petition, submitted in August 2003, the Attorney General's Office stated that the MOE promised to appoint at least 4.5 additional counselor positions during 2004. Immediately thereafter, on 12 August 2003, the Court issued an order nisi compelling the state to explain why the MOE does not appoint the required number of counselors for Arab Bedouin students in the Naqab. In its reply to the order nisi, the MOE claimed that the appointment of the 4.5 counselors was sufficient to meet the needs of the Arab Bedouin students. The MOE further stated that fewer counselors are also appointed in Jewish localities than should be according to the MOE's criteria.

In final arguments presented to the Court before the September 2004 hearing, Adalah countered the state's contentions. Adalah argued that, even if an equal percentage of counselors were appointed for Arab Bedouin students in the Naqab as for Jewish students, they would still be discriminated against, since the former are in greatest need of the counselors owing to their higher-than-average drop-out rate. Therefore, even though Jewish students do not benefit from the MOE's recommended number of counselors, in allocating a lower number of counselors for Arab Bedouin students than for Jewish students, the state is failing to apply the equality principle even according to its formal definition.

To illustrate this argument, Adalah provided the following figures in the final arguments:

Source: MOE response to request for additional information filed by Adalah to the Attorney General's Office, 25 August 2004. Figures noted are from the 2002-2003 academic year.

Source: MOE response to request for additional information filed by Adalah to the Attorney General's Office, 25 August 2004. Figures noted are from the 2002-2003 academic year.

The MOE's commitment to allocate the five additional counselor positions came after the submission of Adalah's final arguments. At the hearing Adalah welcomed the MOE's decision, but contended that the MOE had still not yet fulfilled its duty to the students, as sufficient counselors have not been allocated to ensure equality and to deal with the problem of dropping out. Adalah further argued that the state's piecemeal and reactive manner of appointing additional counselors indicates that the MOE has failed to establish a policy for tackling this important issue. The petition remains pending before the Supreme Court, which is due to deliver its decision.

Adalah Attorney Gadeer Nicola submitted the petition demanding that the MOE appoint counselors for the Arab Bedouin students and argued before the Court on behalf of the petitioners. The petition was filed on behalf of 19 individuals, parents of students aged five to seventeen; the Coalition of Parent Associations for the Improvement of the Arab Educational System in the Naqab; the High Follow-up Committee for Education; the National Association of Arab Parent Associations for the Educational System in Israel; and in Adalah's own name. The respondents are the MOE, the Rahat Municipality, and the other six local councils in the Naqab.

The seven Arab Bedouin towns in the Naqab – Rahat, Lagiyya, Kessife, Tel el-Sebe, Hura, 'Arora, and Segev Shalom – suffer from the highest drop-out rates in the country, and have been provided with the least number of counselor positions to address the problems of students at-risk of dropping out. In the petition, Adalah asked the Court to instruct the MOE to allocate the required number of counselors, as determined by the Ministry's own criteria. The petition presented extensive data on the high drop-out rates among Arab Bedouin students in the Naqab, and the low number of counselors assigned by the MOE in the seven towns. For example, according to 2002 Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) data, in Rahat, the largest of the seven towns, ninth-grade students dropped out at a rate of 23.6%, as compared with an overall drop-out rate of 6.2% among Jewish ninth-grade students in the country. Using criteria based on student numbers and socio-economic factors, the MOE determined that Rahat should be allocated around 15 counselor positions; in fact, only one counselor works in Rahat. According to the MOE's own standards, the seven towns should be allocated a total of almost 46 counselor positions. In reality, these towns are served by only five counselors, or 11% of the required positions.

At the national level, the MOE has determined that state-run Arab schools should be assigned 432 counselors, but as few as 60 positions have actually been appointed. In his annual reports issued over the last few years, the State Comptroller has repeatedly criticized the MOE for not allocating enough counselor positions for both Arab and Jewish state-run schools. In this regard, in his 2002 report, the State Comptroller also emphasized that, "The gap in the Arab sector is bigger because, according to CBS data, the rate of dropping out at the high school level in the Arab sector is higher than the one in the Jewish sector."

In the petition, Adalah argued that the MOE's failure to appoint a sufficient number of counselors violates the Compulsory Education Law - 1949 and its subsequent amendments, which guarantee free, compulsory education for all citizens of Israel from ages 3-16 years and the Rights of Students Law - 2000, which reiterates this right. The MOE's failure to uphold its obligations under the law contributes to the high drop-out rate, and thus to the wider social and economic problems of the Arab Bedouin towns in the Naqab, as documented by all official sources.

Adalah further argued that the MOE is violating students' rights to education, a part of the right to dignity, which is protected by the Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty -1992. By not taking steps required by law to ensure the right of students to education, the Ministry fails to provide the minimum conditions necessary to allow citizens to develop a strong sense of self-worth. The state's failure also violates various articles of international human rights covenants to which Israel is a state party, e.g., Article 13 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights. As the MOE has appointed the required number of counselors in some Jewish schools in the country, its gross failure to do so for Arab Bedouin students in the Naqab constitutes discrimination. Article 28 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child and Article 1 of the Convention against Discrimination in Education (1960) strictly prohibit discrimination on the basis of race or nationality in education.

H.C. 6671/03, Munjid Abu Ghanem, et. al. v. Ministry of Education, et. al.(case pending).