For years, critics of Israel have portrayed the country as a settler-colonial apartheid state that systematically oppresses its Arab minority. Yet anyone who has spent time in Israel is likely to encounter a more complex reality. Arab citizens are an integral part of Israeli society. They serve as physicians, nurses, lawyers, engineers, pharmacists, entrepreneurs, professors and judges. It is commonplace to be treated by an Arab physician at one of Israel’s leading hospitals, work alongside Arab colleagues, or encounter Arab attorneys in the country’s courthouses.
Professor Robert Cherry, emeritus professor of economics at Brooklyn College, set out to examine this disconnect between perception and reality in his new book, “Arab Citizens of Israel: How Far Have They Come?” Drawing on decades of research into discrimination and labor markets, Cherry argues that the widely accepted narrative often overlooks the remarkable social, educational, and economic progress made by Arab citizens since Israel’s founding. While documenting the discrimination and military rule that characterized Israel’s early decades, he concludes that the country’s Arab citizens have undergone a profound transformation that is largely ignored in discussions about Israel today.
Cherry’s interest in the subject grew out of his decades of studying racial discrimination in the United States. After donating to a playground in a Druze village in northern Israel, he became a member of a United Jewish Appeal committee that supported Israeli NGOs.
“I spent a few decades studying racial discrimination in the U.S.,” Cherry said. “It seemed like certain aspects of the dynamic between Jews and Arabs had similarities to what I had studied in the United States between Blacks and Whites.”
The comparison prompted Cherry to explore the experiences of Arab citizens of Israel through the same analytical lens he had applied to discrimination in the American labor market.
Published by Wicked Son Press, the book chronicles the social, economic, and political progress of Israel’s Arab citizens since the first Aliyah in 1882. Cherry also examines how the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack affected Arab-Israeli society, noting that many Arab citizens expressed solidarity with Israel during the war.
“Hamas didn’t distinguish between Arabs and Israelis,” Cherry said, noting that between 40 and 50 Arab citizens were among those killed on October 7. “I was surprised how consistent the support was and how it increased the feeling of being Israelis.”
One of Cherry’s interesting findings while working on the book was the rapid growth of Arab participation in Israel’s high-tech sector. He attributes much of that success to educational initiatives that prepare Arab students for careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics from an early age.
“I was certainly surprised with how quickly they had become large numbers in high tech,” he said. “They started in high school giving prep programs and summer programs so they can meet the standards. That’s one of the differences between the U.S. and Israel. There is much more of what is called developmental affirmative action—you prepare people so they can meet those standards.” Cherry pointed to Nazareth, which has emerged as a growing high-tech hub, as an example of that investment.
Cherry believes these developments receive little attention in the United States, where the conversation about Israel often overlooks the experiences of its Arab citizens.
“People don’t know anything about them,” he said. “If you read The New York Times and The Washington Post, they almost never report about the Arab citizens of Israel. People don’t know that they are doctors, and that Jews are treated by Arab doctors. It’s not part of the narrative. Instead they write about the violence in the Arab communities and that the government doesn’t do anything about it.”
In fact, Cherry said, most of the advances the Arab community enjoyed in Israel, took place under the Netanyahu government.
Cherry also points to the growing number of Arab women entering higher education and the workforce as one of Israel’s most significant changes in recent decades. In his view, expanding educational and employment opportunities has benefited both Arab society and the Israeli economy.
“It wasn’t only a moral issue,” Cherry said. “We couldn’t afford a poor community.” He believes Israeli policymakers recognized that increasing workforce participation among Arab women would strengthen the economy while reducing long-term welfare costs.
Cherry also highlights the limits of social integration between Jewish and Arab citizens compared with other societies he has studied. Unlike contexts where intergroup relationships often develop through friendship, shared neighborhoods, and intermarriage, he notes that in Israel, social boundaries remain more pronounced. Jewish and Arab citizens, he argues, generally live in separate communities, and early education is largely segregated, limiting meaningful interaction before university.
“Employment and educational efforts have been successful in integrating Arab citizens, and there are more Arab teachers in Jewish schools than ever before,” Cherry said. However, he emphasized that structural separation remains significant. “Arabs by and large still live in Arab communities and Jews in Jewish communities… schooling before college isn’t integrated.”
While he acknowledges improvements in mixed cities such as Haifa, Jaffa and Jerusalem, he argues that most children still grow up with limited exposure to the other community. As a result, he sees the presence of Arab teachers in Jewish schools as particularly important. “Jewish kids who have never seen Arabs in a meaningful interactive way before college age may carry stereotypes,” he said. “Having Arab teachers in schools helps create that interaction early. You need that kind of engagement.”
For Cherry, this educational role becomes one of the few consistent bridges between the two communities in an otherwise largely parallel social structure.
When asked whether the Arab citizens he had spoken with recognized how much their lives had changed over the years, Cherry said the answer was not always straightforward.
“It’s hard for some of them to embrace that there has been a real change,” he said. “When you have a population that is only one generation removed from a pretty bad situation, it’s hard for them to feel comfortable.”
Cherry acknowledged that there remains a vocal segment of Arab students who identify with Palestinian nationalism. “There is a section of Arab students that is left-wing, and they still see the most important thing as maintaining unity with the West Bank and Gaza,” he said. “They’re more vocal because they’re university graduates but they don’t represent the majority of Arab citizens.”
During my recent visit to Israel this summer, I observed many of the changes Cherry describes firsthand. Arab citizens were visibly integrated across a range of workplaces—from healthcare and law to business and public services—and their presence in professional environments was both routine and unremarkable.
At the same time, the picture was not uniform across all communities. In particular, Bedouin women remain significantly underrepresented in the workforce, reflecting a combination of social, educational, and economic factors that differ across segments of Arab society.
Taken together, Cherry’s findings point to a reality that is often flattened in public debate. Arab citizens of Israel are not outside the system looking in, nor fully absorbed into it, but increasingly embedded within it in specific sectors of society, while still living within clear social and geographic boundaries.
