ABSTRACT

This chapter examines the attitudes of Mizrahim, especially those of peripheral geographic and socioeconomic status, towards the Palestinians, both citizens of Israel and non-citizens residing in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. It presents the key arguments of split labor market theory as they pertain to Mizrahi-Palestinian relations in Israel. In periods of the economic contraction, Mizrahi Jews, many of whom occupy the bottom sections of the occupational scale, find themselves increasingly in the competition with cheaper Palestinian workers. Development towns (DTs) are small urban settlements, located mostly in outlying areas of the country, which were established in the 1950s and 1960s and populated largely with Mizrahi immigrants. Moreover, the social and economic conditions characteristic of DTs were similar, by and large, to those prevailing in other Mizrahi concentrations—the poor neighborhoods of large and medium-sized cities and immigrant moshavim.