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TROUBLED WATERS: CITIZENSHIP AND COLONIAL ZIONISM IN NAZARETH

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2015

Leena Dallasheh
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Abstract

Focused on the contest over water management in Nazareth during the early years of Israeli statehood (1948–56), this article traces the negotiations that took place between Palestinian residents of Nazareth and Israeli state authorities. I argue that the struggle over this vital natural resource, in a region where it is in short supply was in some measure a matter of fulfilling practical needs, but it was also part of the process of negotiating citizenship. The story of Nazareth's water in the early Israeli period is thus a microcosm of the incorporation of Palestinians as undesired and marginalized citizens into a self-defined Jewish state. Challenging the Palestinian resistance/collaboration dichotomy and the notion of a monolithic Israeli state, I show how both Palestinian citizens and Israeli authorities adopted wide-ranging positions on water management and its broad political implications. Although Palestinian citizens were able to use the space made available through citizenship to further their collective interests, they were ultimately unable to overcome the exclusions inherent to a political system that maintained the dominance of a Jewish majority over a Palestinian minority.

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International Journal of Middle East Studies , Volume 47 , Issue 3 , August 2015 , pp. 467 - 487
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 

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References

NOTES

Author's note: Research for this article was supported by generous grants from the Social Science Research Council and the Palestinian American Research Center. I thank the participants of a workshop at the Center for Palestine Studies at Columbia University for their useful comments on a much earlier version of this essay. I am grateful to Fred Cooper, Zachary Lockman, Ussama Makdisi, Asma al-Naser, Jason Parker, Shira Robinson, and Shareah Taleghani for their valuable feedback.

1 Memo by the Israeli Ministry of Interior (MoI) on a meeting about Nazareth water, 22 January 1953, Israeli State Archives (ISA), Jerusalem, RG50/1932/10.

2 For example, see the interview with ʿAdel Manaʿa and the response, Hadith al-Nas, 30 November 1948; and Ahmad Saʿdi's comments on the panel “The Left in Palestine/The Palestinian Left,” School of Oriental and African Studies, and the responses to them, accessed 25 May 2015, http://vimeo.com/25845651. Cohen has warned against oversimplification of these categories, but even his book became a part of the populist controversy over resistance/collaboration. Cohen, Hillel, ʿArvim Tovim: Ha-Modiʾin ha-Yisraʾeli ve-ha-ʿArvim be-Yisraʾel (Jerusalem: ʿIvrit Publishing House, 2006)Google Scholar.

3 For example, see Falah, Ghazi, “The 1948 Israeli–Palestinian War: The Transformation and De-Signification of Palestine's Cultural Landscape,” Annals of the Association of American Geographers 86 (1996): 256–85CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Lustick, Ian, Arabs in the Jewish State: Israel's Control of a National Minority (Austin, Tex.: University of Texas Press, 1980)Google Scholar; Sa’di, Ahmad, “The Incorporation of the Palestinian Minority by the Israeli State, 1948–1970: On the Nature, Transformation and Constraints of Collaboration,” Social Text 21 (2003): 75–94CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Zureik, Elia, The Palestinians in Israel: A Study in Internal Colonialism (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979)Google Scholar.

4 Especially noteworthy is Robinson, Shira, Citizen Strangers: Palestinians and the Birth of Israel's Liberal Settler State (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2013)Google Scholar. See also Hillel Cohen, ʿArvim Tovim; and Pappé, Ilan, The Forgotten Palestinians: A History of the Palestinians in Israel (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2011)Google Scholar.

5 This historiography is best represented by Landau, Jacob, The Arabs in Israel: A Political Study (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1969)Google Scholar; Rekhess, Eli, ha-Miʿut ha-ʿAravi be-Yisraʾel: Bein Komunizm le-Leʾmiut ʿAravit, 1965–1991 (Tel Aviv: ha-Kibbutz ha-Meuhad, 1993)Google Scholar; and Stendel, Ori, The Minorities in Israel: Trends in the Development of the Arab and Druze Communities, 1948–1973 (Jerusalem: Israel Economist, 1973)Google Scholar.

6 For a critique of traditional scholarship on the colonial state, see Cooper, Frederick and Stoler, Ann Laura, Tensions of Empire: Colonial Cultures in a Bourgeois World (Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1997)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Cooper, Frederick, Colonialism in Question: Theory, Knowledge, History (Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 2005)Google Scholar.

7 Mekorot Water Company Ltd. was founded in 1937 by the Histadrut, the Jewish Agency, and the Jewish National Fund. Alatout, Samer, “Bringing Abundance Back into Environmental Politics: Constructing a Zionist Network of Abundance, Immigration, and Colonization, 1918–1948,” Social Studies of Science 39 (2009): 369–94CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Although much has been written on Israel's water policies, the literature tends to focus on the larger Arab–Israeli conflict and the international dimension of this question. Investigating the internal struggle over water management in Israel, Alatout connects water management to issues of identity, nationalism, and colonialism in Israel. Alatout, , “Locating the Fragments of the State and Their Limits: Water Policymaking in Israel during the 1950s,” Israel Studies Forum 23 (2008): 40–65Google Scholar. By exploring the contest between Nazareth residents and the state over water, my article further considers the significance of water beyond its role in the Arab–Israeli conflict, shedding light on how it fits into Palestinians’ negotiation of citizenship.

8 In 1949 less than 7 percent of the Galilee population was Jewish. Forman, Geremy, “Law and the Historical Geography of the Galilee: Israel's Litigatory Advantages during the Special Operation of Land Settlement,” Journal of Historical Geography 32 (2006): 796–817CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

9 Established in 1921, the Palestine Communist Party was officially anti-Zionist and was made up of Arab and Jewish constituents until 1943, when it split into a Jewish party (PCP) and an Arab party (National League for Liberation, or NLL). The two reunited in 1948. On the NLL, see Budeiri, Musa, The Palestine Communist Party, 1919–1948: Arabs and Jews in the Struggle for Internationalism (London: Ithaca Press, 1979)Google Scholar. On the reunification of MAKI, see Beinin, Joel, Was the Red Flag Flying There? Marxist Politics and the Arab–Israeli Conflict in Egypt and Israel, 1948–1965 (Berkeley, Calif: University of California Press, 1990)Google Scholar.

10 Nazareth's municipality was established in 1875 under Ottoman rule. During the Mandate period, its members were elected by a small segment of male property owners in Nazareth. In 1948, immediately before the end of the Mandate, the mayor and municipal council were appointed by the British District Commissioner after a prolonged legal and public conflict over who would fill these roles. This municipal council served, with minor changes, until 1954, when the first universal municipal elections were held in the city. Leena Dallasheh, “Nazarenes in the Turbulent Tide of Citizenships: Nazareth from 1940 to 1966” (PhD diss., New York University, 2012).

11 The municipality was charged with providing local services to the city, but its authority was greatly restricted by close supervision of the central authority, whether Mandate or Israeli. See al-Ittihad, 7 July 1946; PWD to DC, 4 November 1947, ISA/RG27/2654/N/36 (Jacket 12); Forman, Geremy, “Military Rule, Political Manipulation, and Jewish Settlement: Israeli Mechanisms for Controlling Nazareth in the 1950s,” Journal of Israeli History 25 (2006): 335–59CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

12 On the military government (MG) and its policies, see Jiryis, Sabri, ha-ʿAravim be-Yisraʾel (Haifa: al-Ittihad Press, 1966)Google Scholar; and Robinson, Citizen Strangers.

13 Kamen, Charles, “After the Catastrophe I: The Arabs in Israel, 1948–51,” Middle Eastern Studies 23 (1987): 475CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

14 A Report to Nazareth District Officer, March 1932, ISA/RG27/2654/N/36 (Jacket 1).

15 On water shortage and attempts to solve it between 1932 and 1939, see ISA/RG27/2654/N/36 (Jackets 1 through 5).

16 Telegraph from High Commissioner to the Colonial Government, 23 December 1940, The British National Archives (hereafter TNA) C.O.-733/432; Galilee District Commissioner (DC) to Chief Secretary (CS), 9 February 1946, ISA/RG2.23/505/48.

17 Galilee DC to CS, 9 February 1946, ISA/RG2.23/505/48.

18 DC Notes, 28 January 1947; Financial Secretary to DC, 31 July 1947, ISA/RG2.23/505/48.

19 PWD report, 4 November 1947, ISA/RG27/2654/N/36 (Jacket 12).

20 PWD to DC, ISA/RG27/2654/N/36 (Jacket 12). By that point, the water project had already been halted by the fighting that erupted between Arabs and Jews throughout the country after the UN adopted the Partition Plan for Palestine in November 1947. On the Partition Plan and its aftermath, see Pappé, Ilan, A History of Modern Palestine: One Land, Two Peoples (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

21 The High Commissioner for Palestine appealed to the British Secretary of State: “[I]n view of the special character of Nazareth.. . . it would be most undesirable to leave Palestine after a British occupation of 30 years without ensuring . . . an adequate water supply.” Telegraph, 1 March 1948, ISA/RG2.23/505/48. This request was rejected due to British financial considerations. Telegraph to High Commissioner for Palestine, 9 March 1948, ISA/RG2.23/505/48. Nazareth was eventually granted LP 5,000. Letter from CS to DC, 2 April 1948, ISA/RG27/2654/N/36 (Jacket 12).

22 For example, during the fiscal years 1941–43 the municipality spent almost half of its revenue on the water project. Abstract of Estimates 1941–42, March 1943, ISA/RG2.7/217/37. In 1947–48, almost twice the city's revenue was spent on the water project. Abstract of Estimates 1947–48, March 1947, ISA/RG2.6/196/44.

23 The high commissioner had complete control over the municipal budgets. Haj, Majid Al and Rosenfeld, Henry, Arab Local Government in Israel (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1990), 12Google Scholar.

24 Almost a quarter of the buildings in Nazareth belonged to tax-exempt religious institutions. Letter of the District Officer, 7 July 1933, ISA/RG27/2654/N/36 (Jacket 2).

25 See, for example, Davar, 8 July 1951; and al-Yawm, 6 August 1951.

26 On the first day after its conquest in July 1948, Nazareth had about 15,000 inhabitants and 20,000 refugees. By the beginning of January 1949, there were 5,200 refugees in the city, about a third of the city's population. See Charles Kamen, “After the Catastrophe I,” 475. On the situation in Nazareth in 1948, see Abbasi, Mustafa, “Nazareth in the War for Palestine,” Holy Land Studies 9 (2010): 185–207Google Scholar; and Abbasi, “ʿIr be-Mtsukah: Natseret ve-Baʿayat ha-Plitim ha-ʿAravim ha-Pnimiyim 1948–1949,” Katedra 146 (2013): 117–46Google Scholar.

27 These offices included the MoI, the Ministry of Labor (MoL), the Ministry of Agriculture (MoA), represented mainly by the Water Department, the Ministry of Minorities (MoM), and the Prime Minister's office (PM), represented by the advisor for Arab affairs.

28 Nazareth Municipality to MG, 28 July 1948, Israeli Defense Forces Archives (hereafter IDFA), Tel-Aviv, Israel, 1952/922–114.

29 Municipality to MG, 14 August 1948, IDFA-1952/922–114.

30 Report by the MoI about a meeting between its representatives, the MoL, and the Water Department, 10 September 1950, ISA/RG50/1932/10.

31 The main water authorities, namely Mekorot and Tahal, were partially owned by Zionist institutions, and as such, they were primarily concerned with advancing the interests of Jews rather than of all citizens of the state. Tahal Water Planning, a government-established company in charge of planning Israel's water development project, was partially controlled by the Jewish National Fund and the Jewish Agency. Mekorot, founded in 1937 by the Jewish Agency, continued after the establishment of Israel as a national company and semiofficial body with close ties to the state, which partially owned it. Davis, Uri, Maks, Antonia E. L., and Richardson, John, “Israel's Water Policies,” Journal of Palestine Studies 9 (1980): 3–31CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Raphaeli, Nimrod, “Israel's Water Economy,” Land Economics 41 (1965): 361–64CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For more on the water centralization process, see Alatout, Samer, “State-ing Natural Resources through Law: The Codification and Articulation of Water Scarcity and Citizenship in Israel,” Arab World Geographers 10 (2007): 16–37Google Scholar.

32 Alatout argues that this struggle concluded in late 1953 with the victory of the centralization policy, as proponents of centralization justified it as efficient by constucting water as “Scarce” in Israel. See “‘States’ of Scarcity: Water, Space, and Identity politics in Israel, 1948–59,” Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 26 (2008): 976.

33 Political activity was otherwise limited to the Arab “satellite parties,” promoted by the government-affiliated, Jewish nationalist MAPAI (Land of Israel Workers’ Party). MAPAI promoted these parties to ensure cooperation in the Knesset, even though it did not accept Palestinians among its membership. Some Palestinians also participated in MAPAM (United Workers’ Party), which was initially a leftist opposition party. On Palestinian political involvement, see Ghanem, As‘ad, The Palestinian-Arab Minority in Israel, 1948–2000: A Political Study (Albany, N.Y.: State University of New York Press, 2001)Google Scholar.

34 Residents of Nazareth, led by MAKI, challenged the legitimacy and representativeness of the municipal council from the earliest days of the state. In the 1954 elections, MAKI was the only political party to successfully field candidates (all other elected council members ran in sectarian and family lists). Dallasheh, Leena, “Making Citizenship Count: Nazareth in the Transition between the Mandate and Israel,” in Nazareth: Archeology, History and Cultural Heritage, ed. Yazbak, Mahmoud and Sharif, Sharif (Nazareth, Israel: The Municipality of Nazareth Academic Publication, 2013), 253–69Google Scholar.

35 Nazareth municipality to MG, 28 July 1948, IDFA 1952/922–114.

36 Solts stated that the municipal plan will “land a serious blow to those circles that see the military government in Nazareth . . . only as temporary . . . [and] strengthen the circles that now collaborate with us and see us as a permanent state authority [shilton medini].” Letter to MG Headquarters MG, 9 September 1948, ISA/RG49/308/48.

37 MoM to Ministry of Finance (MoF), 15 September 1948, ISA/RG49/308/48.

38 Mekorot to PM, 16 September 1948, ISA/RG49/308/48.

39 Also ignored was a report prepared at the municipality's request by a Jewish engineer, Perez Etkes, which recommended the Mandate project for its lower cost and higher quality water. Little information is available on the expert or the report. Located in an MoI file, it includes no details about its source, date, or function. ISA/RG50/1932/10. A 1955 MAKI pamphlet asserts that it was prepared on 4 March 1951 by a “prominent Israeli water engineer.” See ISA/RG50/2062/40. On the authorities’ view of the municipality, see, for example, Water Department to MoA, 17 September 1953, ISA/RG97/2043/12.

40 Mekorot to MoL, 26 November 1950, ISA/RG95/6183/11. See also Mekorot and Water Department, 8 and 25 May 1951, ISA/RG97/2043/12; ʿAfula Mayor to Ministry of Interior, 12 February 1953; and an exchange between the MoI, the MoL, and the Water Department and Mekorot which took place in April–June 1953, ISA/RG50/1932/10.

41 Ministerial Committee Decision, 17 September 1948, IDFA-1952/922–114.

42 MoM to MoD, 29 September and 11 October 1948, ISA/RG49/308/48. On the minister's positions, see MoM to Minister of Foreign Affairs, undated, ISA/RG130/2420/29. Kamen argues that although the minister gave priority to military and political considerations, he sought “compromises which would reduce the degree of suffering . . . [of] the Arab populations.” He further states that the ministry was “perhaps the single high-ranking official body which attempted consistently to carry out an approach marked by fairness regarding the claims of the Arabs in Israel.” Kamen, “After the Catastrophe I,” 486. The Ministry of Minorities was created to deal with the Arab population in the country. Tom Segev suggests that the cabinet created it as a ministry to include Shitrit as the “Sephardic minister,” and the position seemed important to Ben Gurion only insofar as it could be used to appease the Sephardim. However, in July 1949, when the Cabinet realized the position's importance in setting policy toward Palestinian citizens, the government dissolved it. Segev, Tom, 1949: The First Israelis (New York: Owl Books by Henry Holt and Company, 1998)Google Scholar. On the weak position of the MoM and Shitrit, see Ozacky-Lazar, Sarah, ha-ʿAravim ba-ʿEsor ha-Rishon (Raʿanana: The Open University of Israel, 2006), 16–20Google Scholar; and Peled, Alisa, “The Other Side of 1948: The Forgotten Benevolence of Behor Shitrit and the Ministry of Minority Affairs,” Israel Affairs 8 (2002), 84–103CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

43 Minutes of Meeting in Nazareth Municipality, 7 November 1948, ISA/RG49/308/48 and 12 December 1948, IDFA-1952/922–1337.

44 MoM to Nazareth Mayor, 25 November 1948, ISA/RG49/308/48. The Nazareth military governor was also instructed to use all of his powers to convince the Nazareth municipality. MG headquarters to Nazareth MG, 30 November 1948, IDFA-1952/922–114.

45 The subcommittee was appointed by a ministerial committee charged with Nazareth. MG headquarters, 12 December 1948, IDFA-1952/922–114.

46 Mayor to MG, 14 December 1949; Arab workers’ Division to MoL, 25 September 1950, ISA/RG95/ 6183/11; MoL to Mekorot, 27 December 1950, ISA/RG95/6183/11.

47 Water Department to Committee on Nazareth Water, 17 June 1951, ISA/RG97/2043/12. Representatives of Mekorot, the Water Department, the MoI, and the military government were all in attendance. Report by MoI, 20 June 1951, ISA/RG50/1932/10.

48 Due to a water shortage, residents received water only once every two weeks. Health Department in Nazareth, 15 October 1948, IDFA 1952/922–114. See also later newspaper reports about water shortages and the problems they were creating: Davar, 8 July 1951; and al-Yawm, 6 August 1951.

49 As expressed by an MoL representative, Arab Workers’ Division to MoL, 25 September 1950, ISA/RG95/6183/11. Minister Shitrit made a similar argument earlier on. Minutes of Government Meetings, 23 February 1949.

50 MG to MoI, 6 September 1951, ISA/RG50/1932/10. While the MG refers vaguely to “certain parties” using the issue for elections, a police report specifically mentions MAKI: 6 July 1951, ISA/RG79/4/19. MAKI also referenced the water issue in al-Ittihad. See, for example, 2 and 23 June 1951.

51 Another factor that contributed to the attention to the problem was the Ministry of Tourism's concern about the implication of water shortage on tourists' perception of Israel, which affected international public opinion. Exchange between Ministry of Tourism, the MG, and the MoI, 17 July 1951, 13, 18, and 30 August 1951, ISA/RG50/1932/10.

52 Report by Nazareth MG, 11 September 1951, ISA/RG97/2043/12. Saffuriya was depopulated during the 1948 war. In October 1949, its houses were demolished to prevent people from returning. Hoffman, Adina, My Happiness Bears No Relation to Happiness: A Poet's Life in the Palestinian Century (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2009)Google Scholar.

53 See discussions of the Committee on Nazareth, 14 November 1951, ISA/RG95/6145/22.

54 Rabinowitz, Dan, Overlooking Nazareth: The Ethnography of Exclusion in Galilee (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. On Israeli Judaization policies, see Falah, Ghazi, “Israeli ‘Judaization’ Policy in Galilee,” Journal of Palestine Studies 20 (1991): 69–85CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Yiftachel, Oren, “Ethnocracy: the Politics of Judaizing Israel/Palestine,” Constellations 6 (1999): 364–90CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

55 Mekorot, 25 October 1951, ISA/RG97/2043/12.

56 MoA to MG, 10 January 1952, ISA/RG97/2043/12. See in particular the letter from the Water Department to the MoI in which he repeats his expectation that Nazareth's municipal efforts will fail. Letter, 3 March 1952, ISA/RG50/1932/10.

57 Al-Yawm, 24 February 1952.

58 The Point Four Program was part of President Truman's Cold War foreign policy of extending the US sphere of influence by granting technical and financial aid to underdeveloped countries. Although Israel did not fit the program's model, there was a mission there focused on assistance for regulating the economy, though it also included technical assistance for which Nazareth sought to apply. An insider description of the program in the Middle East can be found in Halford L. Hoskins, , “Point Four with Reference to the Middle East,” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 268 (1950): 85–95CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also an interview with Montrie, Charles, United States Foreign Assistance Oral History Program, Foreign Affairs Oral History Collection (Arlington, Va.: Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training, 1996)Google Scholar, accessed 6 December 2014, http://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/PNACB756.pdf.

59 Letter from MG, 13 August 1952, ISA/RG50/1932/10. The MG viewed negatively Vergani's offer to help, deeming it “undesirable.” See Letter to MoA, 18 April 1952, ISA/RG97/2043/12. The American mission offered funding for a water project, but it was never advanced. See W. L. Karrer, “Water Resources and Development,” 19 January 1954, ISA/RG50/1932/10.

60 Memo from a Meeting about Nazareth Water, 22 January 1953, ISA/RG50/1932/10.

61 The council did not detail why it chose the MoL, but the latter had a representative in the city who was very involved in its affairs. Municipal Council Decision, 19 November 1952, ISA/RG95/6183/11.

62 Memo, 22 January 1953, ISA/RG50/1932/10.

63 Meeting between the MoA, the MoI, and the Water Department, 11 October 1953, ISA/RG97/2043/12. Despite the minister's agreement, there was no unanimous commitment within his office. Engineer Zvi Leibovitz submitted a report about Nazareth water, asserting that Nazareth's well could deliver sufficient amounts of water to the city. Nazareth's independent project was also raised by the head of the Minorities Department in the MoI in a meeting with the minister, 4 January 1954, ISA/RG50/1932/10.

64 MoI Report about Minister's visit in Nazareth, 12 February 1954, ISA/RG50/1932/10.

65 Exchanges within MoI, 13 and 29 January 1954, ISA/RG50/1932/2.

66 On Nazareth municipal elections, see Dallasheh, “Nazarenes,” chap. 3.

67 MAKI Municipal Elections Manifest, undated, ISA/RG79/164/6.

68 For the most part, elections in Nazareth were not based on parties but rather on independent electoral lists. The “Popular List” Elections Manifest, undated, ISA/RG79/164/6. The local MAPAM party also mentioned water problems. Elections Manifest, undated, ISA/RG79/164/6.

69 Minutes of a Meeting in MoF, 17 August 1954, ISA/RG95/6183/11.

70 The mayor was elected by council members after intense government intervention. Dallasheh, “Nazarenes,” 218–20.

71 This was later affirmed in a report by the advisor for Arab affairs from 12 October 1955, ISA/RG95/6183/11. By establishing this settlement, authorities embarked upon a new mechanism of control—the use of space. See Forman, “Military Rule, Political Manipulation, and Jewish Settlement.” Oren Yiftachel argues that Israeli spatial policies were aimed at control over the Palestinian population. As he puts it, “these policies have worked persistently to erode the village's land resources, to contain its residential expansion, to encircle the village with Jewish settlements, [and] to impose surveillance over the life of its residents.” Yiftachel, , “The Internal Frontier: Territorial Control and Ethnic Relations in Israel,” Regional Studies 30 (1996): 501CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

72 Report by MoI, 7 September 1954, ISA/RG50/2062/40.

73 Mekorot to MoI, 28 April 1955, ISA/RG95/6183/11; Meeting about Nazareth Water Project between the MoL, the MoI, the MoF, and Mekorot, 17 May 1955, ISA/RG95/6183/11.

74 Minutes of Meeting between MoI and Municipal Representatives, 18 May 1954, ISA/RG50/2062/40.

75 Police report about Rokah's visit, 4 July 1955, ISA/RG79/164/7. MAKI's leaflet about the visit, 25 June 1955, ISA/RG79/28/34.

76 MAKI Elections Pamphlets, MAKI Archival Documents from Yad Tabenkin, Ramat Efal, Israel, YT-16-10-3-4(AJ).

77 MAKI Leaflet, 21 January 1955, ISA/RG79/164/7; and MAKI Pamphlet, undated, ISA/RG50/2062/40. A handwritten comment on the pamphlet mentions May 1955. In light of the events, this date appears to be correct.

78 Ibid.

79 Telegraph to MoI, signed by Hilmi ‘Abbas and Maryam Khuri, who claimed to speak for “hundreds of Nazareth residents gathered Saturday evening,” 5 June 1955, ISA/RG50/2062/40.

80 On the temporary nature of the project, see MoI Report, 4 July 1955, ISA/RG50/2062/40.

81 PM Office to Mekorot, 18 July 1955, ISA/RG43/5431/16; Police Report about the Ceremony, 28 July 1955, ISA/RG79/164/7.

82 Ha’aretz, 25 July 1955.

83 English Translation of the PM Speech, 24 July 1955, Central Zionist Archives (CZA), Jerusalem, A245/46/2.

84 Rokah's Speech, 24 July 1955, ISA/RG50/2062/40.

85 Report by MoI, 7 August 1955, ISA/RG50/2062/40. It is likely that these high officials were members of the General Zionist Party since such appointments tend to be political. These officials’ frustration probably stemmed from their party's loss of power in the elections, in which they received 5 percent less votes than in the previous elections. Davar, 27 July 1955. On political appointments in Israeli offices, see Sharkansky, Ira, “Israeli Civil Service Positions Open to Political Appointments,” International Journal of Public Administration 12 (1989): 731–48CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

86 Minorities Department to MoI Director General, 14 October 1955, ISA/RG50/2062/40.

87 Discerning the influence of the inauguration event on Nazarenes’ voting patterns in the national elections is difficult, but it seems it did exist. MAPAI and its satellite parties gained 60 percent of the votes in Nazareth, while MAKI gained 37 percent, a decrease of about 8 percent from the 1951 elections. Al-Ittihad, 29 July 1955 and 4 August 1951; al-Yawm, 24 August 1955.

88 The municipality began complaining about water shortage in September 1955. See Decision of the Municipal Water Committee, 2 September 1955, ISA/RG50/2062/40. The municipality and the opposition periodically complained about water shortage for the years to follow. See, for example, Mayor of Nazareth to MoI, 18 June 1956; MAKI Publication, August 1956, ISA/RG50/2062/40; Municipality to Mekorot, 1 March 1958; Municipality to MoI, 15 July ISA/RG50/2062/40; Minorities Department to DC, 16 January 1958; and Municipality to Mekorot and MoI, 1 March and 15 July 1958, respectively, ISA/RG50/2062/40.

89 Mekorot to Water Department, 1 July 1955, ISA/RG50/2062/40; Water Department to Nazareth Municipality, 5 July 1955; and MG to Mayor, 8 September 1955, ISA/RG97/2043/12.

90 MoI and the advisor for Arab affairs both thought that any action regarding the well should be postponed. MoI and AAA to Water Department, 7 July 1955 and 16 August 1955, respectively, ISA/RG97/2043/12. On the well lease, see Mekorot to Water Department, 15 December 1955, ISA/RG97/2043/12.

91 Water rights were part of Mekorot's general policy. In addition to the price of actual water consumed, and in order to provide water to a town, Mekorot demanded that the local council pay a bulk sum of money, which covered the municipality's investment in the water project. This sum was considered payment for providing a certain amount of water annually—what Mekorot called “water rights.”

92 MG Report about MoI Promise to Nazareth Mayor, which asserted that the government contribution was not a loan, 27 October 1954, ISA/RG102/17111/11; and Letter from Northern DC, 25 August 1957, ISA/RG50/2062/40.

93 Minutes of Meeting between Mekorot and Government Officials, 29 August 1955, ISA/RG97/2043/12.

94 The advisor for Arab affairs stressed avoiding a solution that would lead to the dependence of Upper Nazareth on the Nazareth municipality. Report, 12 October 1955, ISA/RG102/17023/7. See also Minorities Department to Director General of MoI, 14 October 1955, ISA/RG50/2062/40.

95 MoL to MoI, 16 April 1958, ISA/RG95/6183/11; Mekorot to MoF, 17 September 1956, ISA/RG50/ 2062/40. Use of the term “rights” in the documents is confusing; it is not clear what the significance of water rights would have been if the municipality did not own the purchased rights.

96 Municipal Water Committee Decision, 2 September 1955, ISA/RG50/2062/40.

97 Among other steps, the municipality threatened to launch a campaign to collect donations in the country and abroad in order to complete its water project. Letter from Mayor of Nazareth to MoI, 18 June 1956, ISA/RG50/2062/40. The municipality also acted to improve the water situation in the city by activating its other sources in Saffuriyya. Al-Ittihad, 29 May 1956.

98 Before the water project was executed, residents of Nazareth paid 240p/m3, while residents of Haifa paid 170p/m3 and residents of ‘Afula, a Jewish town near Nazareth, paid 150p/m3. Minutes of a Meeting with MoI on 22 December 1954, ISA/RG97/2043/12. Nazareth residents paid three times the price of water charged to the Jewish towns of Holon, Hadera, and Kfar Saba. MoD to MoL, 14 January 1958, ISA/RG95/6183/11. The price for water rights set by Mekorot was extremely high, even “fantastical,” as stated by the MoD in MoD to Advisor, 12 January 1956, ISA/RG102/17023/7.

99 The municipality actually suffered losses from providing water to the city. Minutes of Visit in Nazareth, 10 September 1957, ISA/RG50/2062/40.

100 Decision of Municipal Council, 5 August 1958, ISA/RG50/2062/40.

101 MAKI Publication, August 1957, ISA/RG50/2062/40.

102 Accountant General to MoF, 1 September 1958, ISA/RG95/6183/11.