Adalah Demands that Education Ministry Connect 17 Arab Bedouin Schools in Israel with over 9,200 Pupils to Electricity

05/08/2012

(Beer el-Sabe, Israel) On 26 July 2012, Adalah sent letters to the Director of the Southern District of the Ministry of Education, Amira Hamim, and the head of the Abu Basma Regional Council in the Naqab (Negev), Rahmim Yona, demanding that they connect 17 schools in 10 Arab Bedouin villages to the national electrical network before the coming school term begins at the end of August. Adalah Attorney Sawsan Zaher argued in the letter that the schools operate on electric generators that do not provide sufficient power, either in amount or quality, for regular daily educational activities.

Over 9,200 Arab Bedouin students, citizens of Israel, attend these schools. There are 332 regular classes and 21 special education classes. The letter emphasized that these schools function in accordance with the master plans developed especially to facilitate the establishment of mobile buildings for essential services for the Arab Bedouin citizens of Israel living in the Naqab. This means that despite the fact that some of the 17 schools are located in “unrecognized villages”, there is no planning reason that they should not be connected to the national electricity grid. The local authority responsible for education in all of these towns is the Abu Basma Regional Council.

Adalah emphasized in the letter that not connecting the schools to the electricity network prevents them from operating air conditioners regularly during classes; in fact, seven of the 17 schools do not have air conditioners at all although temperatures in the Naqab desert often exceed 40 degrees centigrade. The lack of air conditioning in the classrooms, or their only partial functioning, increases the difficulty of learning significantly, to the point that on very hot or very cold days, the principals are forced to cancel classes and send students home. The lack of electricity also prevents the establishment of other vital school amenities, including laboratories, computers, sufficient lighting, and libraries. Furthermore, the generators are noisy and frequently disturb the students and teachers. All these factors create a negative impact on the quality of education given to the students.

Attorney Zaher argued in the letter that the Arab Bedouin schools are the only schools in the country that are still not connected to the national electrical network. The lack of connection constitutes a violation of the students’ basic rights to equality in educational opportunities as well as their rights to dignity; it is discrimination on the basis of nationality.

In July 2009, Adalah petitioned the Supreme Court demanding that two schools in the Arab Bedouin village of Abu Tlul (for 1800 students) be connected to the national electrical grid. Adalah included an expert opinion of an electrical engineer to this petition, who stressed the harmful effects to students’ safety of placing the generators near the schools. After filing the petition, in November 2009, the state committed to connecting all the schools in the Arab Bedouin unrecognized villages to the national electricity network, in lieu of the power generators that currently provide electricity to the schools. Press Release

	Name	Village	# of students	# of classes	Special education?	Air Conditioners?
1	Awrat Secondary	Umm-Batin	282	9		Yes
2	Abu Kaf	Umm-Batin	567	18	2	No
3	Al-Sanabel	Umm-Batin	540	19	1	Yes
4	Waha Al-Nakhil	Umm-Batin	774	26	2	No
5	Al-Atrash Alif	Al-Atrash	874	29		No
6	Kohli	Kohli	250	12	1	No
7	Abu Qarenat A	Abu Qarenat	600	22		Yes
8	Waha al-Sahara	Al-Zarnouq	900	32		Yes
9	Al'Azazma A	Wadi al-Na'am	850	30		Yes
10	Al'Azazma B	Wadi al-Na'am	807	28		Yes
11	Al'Azazma J	Wadi al-Na'am	250	12		Yes
12	Alsayyid A	Alsayyid	429	16	5	No
13	Alsayyid B	Alsayyid	480	17	2	Yes
14	Alsayyid J	Alsayyid	521	19	7	No
15	Beer Al-Mashash	Beer Al-Mashash	508	19		Yes
16	Tel Arad	Tel Arad	340	15	1	Yes
17	Abda	Abda	232	9		No