In Case You Missed It: The Arab-Israeli Insurrection Within Israel's Borders

Since 1948, there has rarely been an insurrection by the Israeli-Arab community like the one during this most recent war. As Israel recently faced a barrage of missiles from Gaza in the South and Hezbollah from the North, attacks have also come from within Israel from its native Arab population. Here to analyze how this has come about and to offer possible solutions is Dr. Reven Berko.

Dr. Lt. Col. (Ret.) Reuven Berko is a distinguished scholar and analyst on Islamic and Arab Studies, whose research focuses on radical fundamentalist Islam. He holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from Haifa  University and acquired a unique level of academic expertise in the field of the “Operational Code of Radical Islam.”

Berko served as a Case Officer mainly in Lebanon and Gaza and currently serves as a Prisoners’ Interrogator in reserve duty and received Israel’s prestigious “Head of the Intelligence Corps Award for Creative Thinking.” Prior to his service in Unit 504, an intelligence unit also responsible for prisoner interrogation, Berko served as an officer at the Paratroopers Brigade.  

Following his military retirement and role as head of the Israel Antiquities Authority’s Robbery Prevention Unit, Berko served for 10 years as Col. (Ret.) Advisor on Arab Affairs to the Chief of Jerusalem Police. He advised senior policymakers and in charge of mediation between Israel’s Arab population and the police.

Today, Berko is a frequent senior commentator and contributor in the international broadcast regarding Arab and Islamic Affairs. With his experience in both academic and practical contexts, Berko provides an original approach to understanding the complex developments regarding the Islamic and Arab Worlds.

Antisemitic incitement has been a staple of Palestinian propaganda for decades. With social media, incitement for violence took a new turn as it assumed a life of its own. In 2015, what became known as the “Stabbing Intifada,” witnessed a wave of seemingly independent terrorist attacks on Israelis that were not centrally organized. At the time, Prime Minister Netanyahu described it as, “Bin Laden meets Mark Zuckerberg.” Taking those events as a case study, Mansour will look into how symbolic systems are created and deployed to create psychological conditions for young Palestinians that produce such violence in a specific prescribed way and coordinate such actions between individuals.

Hussein Aboubakr Mansour is the Director for Emerging Democratic Voice in the Middle East. Hussein is a native Egyptian who tried to counter antisemitism in Egypt and promote normalization with Israel. He participated in the Arab Spring and received political asylum in the United States in 2012.

Hussein worked as an instructor for language and culture at the Defense Language Institute at Monterey, California then proceeded to work as an educator and public speaker for StandWithUs, educating students about cultural and geopolitical issues in the Middle East as well as helping them counter antisemitism.

Hussein is the author of his autobiography “Minority of One: The Unchaining of the Arab Mind,” and he has also written articles that have appeared in the Jewish Journal, the Times of Israel, Mosaic Magazine, and Commentary.