Exclusion and marginalization over the years severely harms humans and can lead to a situation where what motivates them is the instinct for survival.
This is what bothers me as a professional, who belongs to the Bedouin society and sees the frustration of the young people.
We recently witnessed extensive coverage of the passenger bus, which was hit by rocks while traveling near the village of Abu Talul.
Anyone know the village?
Heard about it?
Do you know his story?
Do you know the residents and young people living in it?
Sure no one.
It is one of the villages recognized by the state, as part of the partial recognition policy, in 1998. 24 years have passed, but the village remains without development and infrastructure of electricity and water, without roads, without communication network, without places of entertainment for young people or cultural institutions.
The list is still long and the village of Abu Talul is no exception in the landscape.
From this village were probably thrown the stones that harmed the innocent, stones that have a story behind them that no one wants to hear about years of neglect and neglect, a story of exclusion and marginalization, of dispossession and institutional violence.
Hopeless young people who want to be accepted to school, to succeed, to integrate into the labor market, to earn a decent living, to establish a home and a family;
Young people who have lost the dream - the dream to integrate, to live in security, to be proud of their belonging and their identity, the dream to be and be seen ... This dream recedes over the years and becomes impossible.
How can you dream?
How can one succeed when the basic conditions do not exist?
How is it possible when the light is not visible on the horizon?
Instead of dreams there are disappointments and frustration, and the frustration is very destructive both to the individual and to society as a whole.
A study I conducted among educated Bedouin youth regarding their sense of belonging found that the young people felt a strong belonging to a cross-border Arab Islamic ideology.
They feel a lack of belonging to their village of residence, and on the other hand - a strong belonging to their tribe, which also gives them a sense of protection and security.
The feeling of non-belonging has health and mental consequences and entails negative behaviors such as rejection, avoidance, abandonment and disconnection.
When people feel that their belonging is threatened, they will exhibit diverse responses of difficulties in self-regulation, a sense of defeat, and violent behavior.
Rather, in cases where policies tend to obscure the indigenous place, especially in colonial regimes, a practice is developed that aims to protect the indigenous identity and way of life.
This is what happens to the Bedouin society in the south, which suffers from land dispossession and exclusion.
Add to this the fact that Bedouin society is a young society (70 percent of which are men and women aged 40-8), which is in transition from a traditional society to a modern society, alongside the strengthening of Islam, and you will get another tier of difficulty.
In order to promote the young people's sense of belonging to the village and to society in general, they must invest in developing infrastructure in the Bedouin villages, investing in places of recreation and employment, investing in education and improving their quality of life.
These are basic rights of every citizen and the Bedouin youth are the citizens of the state and not its enemies.
The stones thrown from the arena of frustration and exclusion are a warning sign that obliges us all to see the Bedouin youth as a resource to the Negev and not as a nuisance.
The author is a senior lecturer and researcher at the School of Social Work at Sapir College
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