Military government, political control and crime : The case of Israeli Arabs

Abstract

This paper deals with the different methods used to control the Israeli Arab population during the military government (1948–1966). I have sought to expand the standard conceptual framework that serves most criminologists in Israel, and discuss the broader context in which the political control of the Arab population took place. It is vital to consider this context because a significant amount of criminality among the Arab population was an outcome of the political control imposed upon it. The principal goal of the analysis is to clarify the ways in which the political control influenced the criminal process, and to point out to the theoretical and empirical importance of the links between politics and crime, when discussing crime amongst the Arab minority in Israel.