Mohammad Kabiya is a Bedouin Arab Muslim who serves in the Israeli army, providing him with a unique perspective on Israel that he shared in a Prager University video.
Kabiya explains in the video that in 2002, he wasn’t sure on whether to support Israel or the Palestinians. At that time, Palestinians were terrorizing Israelis with suicide bombing, prompting the Jewish state to send troops into the West Bank, resulting in the death of numerous Palestinians.
Additionally, Kabiya was perplexed to see many of his Arab friends joining the Israeli army. When he asked them why they did so, they replied: “Our home is here, in Israel. Our home is under attack. Our neighbors in this home are Jews. They are being attacked. We fight together.”
What eventually convinced Kabiya to support Israel was when Hamas launched rockets into Israel, and yet his fellow students at Technion stood with Hamas.
“Did these students not understand that those rockets could just as easily be aimed at them?” said Kabiya. “Hamas didn’t care who they killed as long as they landed inside the borders of Israel. Had my fellow Arab students forgotten that Israel had left Gaza a few years before? That there wasn’t a single Israeli living there?”
Kabiya decided to leave school for the Israel Defense Force (IDF), where he served in the Israeli Air Force and then the Search & Rescue Helicopter Unit.
“Our job was to save lives. We never concerned ourselves with the identity of the people who needed our help,” said Kabiya. “We rescued Syrian civilians wounded in their country’s civil war, Palestinian children from Gaza requiring urgent medical care, and countless Israelis of every religious and ethnic background. A life—whether it is Muslim or Jewish, Palestinian or Israeli—is a life.”
Kabiya was the only Bedouin at his base, but he wasn’t treated any differently from anyone else.
“The only thing that mattered was keeping Israel—our home—safe,” said Kabiya. “We came from all parts of the country and from many parts of the world. We were every shade of skin color. Our shared goal created a deep bond.”
Kabiya chooses to serve in the Israeli army because the Jewish state guarantees freedom to its citizens, even those who wave the Palestinian flag on college campuses.
The full video can be seen below:
