Date of Graduation
Spring 4-2015
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts in Human Rights Education (HRE)
College/School
School of Education
Department/Program
International and Multicultural Education (IME)
First Advisor
Onllwyn Cavan Dixon
Abstract
This study seeks to critique and confront past and present iterations of political Zionism through a combination of historical excavation and discursive analysis, informed by the present embodiment of this discourse in the form of violence and violations of Palestinian human rights in the context of the Naqab, the southern region of historic Palestine, where Bedouin communities continue to reside and resist Israel's (ongoing) colonization of their land. The Prawer Plan, a proposed Israeli policy to be implemented in the Naqab/Negev, threatens approximately 70,000 Arab Bedouin Israeli citizens of with forced expulsion and displacement. In addition, 35 Bedouin villages unrecognized by the Israeli state have been slated for destruction. The Israeli state shrouds this plan and its devastating implications with/in the language of development. For the Jewish population of the region, however, development will be implemented in an entirely different manner. In fact, a completely separate plan has been developed for this population. This plan is not an official piece of state legislation but a project of the Jewish National Fund, a parastatal organization that has functioned for more than a century to facilitate, enact, and maintain the Zionist colonization of Palestine. Thus, although Blueprint Negev appears to be completely separate from the Prawer legislation, this is a misconception that functions to obscure the policies' perpetuation of systemic inequity and injustice. Through the discursive analysis of Zionist mythologies and their effects, both historically and in the present, this inquiry seeks to identify strategic points of intervention, particularly those that might be useful to struggles for Palestinian freedom, human rights, and self-determination in the immediate present.
Recommended Citation
Schoenwald, Ayla Jay, "The Development of Apartheid in the Naqab Israel’s Prawer Plan and the Jewish National Fund’s Blueprint Negev" (2015). Master's Theses. 124.
https://repository.usfca.edu/thes/124
