FM to propose plan for new Druse community

Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman on Sunday vowed to send the cabinet a proposal to build a new Druse community for 500 families in the Western Galilee, to help ease the housing shortages facing the Druse sector.

Liberman proposed the plan during a meeting in Beit Jann with leaders from the Druse and Circassian communities, also attended by Public Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch.

Liberman said the plan is a continuation of a government decision from February 13, 2011, to launch a multi-year NIS 680 million development plan for Druse and Circassian communities in northern Israel.

During the meeting, Liberman told those gathered that he is aware of housing shortages in the Druse community and shortages of land for building.

One of the locations Liberman proposed is the area known as Horvat Inbal, once the location of an ancient Druse village.

Amal Nasraladin, a former member of the Knesset for the Likud from 1977 to 1988 and the founder of the Druse branch of Yad L’Banim, told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday that proposals like Liberman’s are long overdue.

“The time has come to build a new Druse community. We are all in favor of this. Every single day the community is increasing, and we have nowhere to grow.”

Nasraladin said that by his estimates the Druse community has grown from 13,000 before the founding of the state to around 120,000 today. He said the supply of available housing and land has not kept up with the demand, causing a litany of problems for the community.

The housing shortage has had a strong effect in particular on young men who finish their army service, get married and want to build a house, only to find that they have nowhere in their communities to build legally, placing them in a situation where many end up violating the law, Nasraladin said.

“We have a shortage of housing for around 3,000 people in the Druse community.
This program should be only the beginning.”