The Arab population in Israel is engaged in an ongoing struggle for equality in all spheres of life. At the same time this population also has a major share in the struggle of all Israeli peace forces - Jewish and Arab - against the occupation and for a just peace, as well as in the struggles to defend democratic rights, workers' rights and economic welfare, and for full equality of all citizens in all fields.

The Arabs in Israel are Israeli citizens and part of the Arab Palestinian people. They constitute a national minority comprising some 900,000 citizens, about 18% of the total population. The great majority of them are hired workers who are employed outside their own communities. The number of those engaged in agriculture has shrunk steadily, due to repeated confiscations of land owned by the Arab population in Israel.

All governments of Israel have continued along the basic line of perpetuating the discrimination. Nevertheless, the many struggles conducted over the years did yield some significant achievements. Among them were prevention of some additional land confiscations, and suspension of the implementation of others; recognition of some Arab communities as cities, after years when - despite having inhabitants in the tens of thousands - they were officially designated "villages"; prevention in many cases of the demolition of "illegal" Arab houses; and the allocation of certain government budgets. But the policy of discrimination did not change in its fundaments, and in some spheres the situation actually worsened.

After more than fifty years of the state of Israel's existence, there still exist racist discriminatory Basic Laws, such as the Law of Return giving automatic Israeli citizenship to any Jew, immediately upon arrival in Israel, while denying it from relatives of non-Jewish long standing Israeli citizens), whose abolition is long overdue. Moreover, there is a de-facto prohibition on Arabs purchasing land at nearly all parts of the country - in particular at the "state lands" controlled by the Israel Lands Authority and the Jewish National Fund, which constitute the great majority of land in Israel. Many workplaces - in the government service as well as public and other corporations - are effectively closed to Arabs. Many Arab academics are, due to that kind of discrimination, debarred from working at their professions.

The discrimination is obvious on countless issues such as property tax - levied in theory on all privately-owned land, in practice nearly only upon ones in Arab ownership; robbery of land; demolition of "illegal" houses; the appointment of unelected municipal councils at small and medium-size Arab communities, which are often composed of the current ruling party's hacks and its favorites; the denial of even the most vital services, such as water, electricity, clinics and schools to many communities (especially in the Negev region).

It is no accident that even according to official statistics many of the Israeli communities most hard-hit by poverty and unemployment are Arab ones. More than 40% of the Arab families still live under the poverty line (double the national average). Many villages are still officially "unrecognized" as far as the government is concerned, which means that their inhabitants are denied the most basic rights. Very severe neglect, poverty and overcrowding are also the lot of the Arab inhabitants in the mixed cities.

The educational system in the Arab villages suffers from particular neglect. There are far too few classrooms as compared with the needs, and the existing ones are very overcrowded and often located in buildings not fitted for the

role of schools. There are no possibilities for auxiliary and complementary lessons (that are provided at many schools in the Jewish Sector). There is a big lack of skilled teachers.

The aims of Arab education in Israel, unlike those of the Jewish one, are not defined by law. Though having the formal status of an official language in Israel, Arabic does not enjoy that status in practice. The Arab population is denied the possibility of educating its young in the Arab national culture, including modern Arabic literature and poetry. Despite having Arabic as their medium of instruction, a curriculum concentrating almost exclusively upon the Jewish culture and heritage is enforced upon the schools in the Arab sector.

The CPI - as well as Hadash, since that front's formation in 1977 - played a central role in the struggle against national discrimination and for equality. They were not only a prime electoral power but also a source of respect and of public and moral authority, whose central role in the struggle was recognized by all other political forces. CPI and Hadash also played a central role in creating the organs that led the Arab population's struggle, such as the Land Defence Committee and the Monitoring Committee.

In recent years there was ongoing erosion in this position, due in no small measure to the internal crisis of both CPI and Hadash. Moreover, there was a concomitant weakening of the Arab population's general organs themselves; some of them, such the Land Defence Committee, no longer function. The weakening of CPI and Hadash was exploited by other movements whose power increased - such as the Islamic Movement with its different factions, Balad (the National Democratic Alliance) and Mada (the Democratic Arab Party).

Regardless of our deep political differences with some of the parties active in the Arab sectors, we of course altogether reject the recently made calls to outlaw any party working within this population, and even more - the demands to impose a kind of new martial law on the Arab population in Israel. We condemn the attempt to make use of terrorist acts against innocent civilians - acts perpetrated by individuals, acts which we strongly condemn and which directly help the enemies of peace - as a pretext for incitement against the whole Arab population in Israel and demands to limit this population's rights.

We note that among the Arab population there was felt a great disappointment at the phenomenon of "parliamentary seat trading" - that is, of unnatural and unprincipled electoral alliances, formed amidst naked haggling and with the partners in such alliances united by neither ideology nor political strategy, but only by short-term electoral considerations. Such deals have become more and more characteristic of the Israeli political system in general, and of that among the Arab population in particular.

As for ourselves, we will continue - also in the field of the Arab population's struggle - the tradition of a principled and thorough struggle, our main concern remaining always the interest of the struggle itself.