We would like to allow Ms. Aida Toma-Suleiman to respond the things that were said here.

Aida Toma-Suleiman: I invite you to read the document, so you will not be misled with wrong quotations. They do not say “Jews” have taken (robbed), but “governments” took (robbed). We know the difference between a political entity and the people.

It is not true that we do not speak of solidarity between Jews and Arabs. The Arab participants who wrote this document know how to be in solidarity and to fight for democracy.

It is important to mention that the word autonomy in the document refers to culture, education and religion, not to national autonomy. We have a right as a minority to have a representative body such as the Follow-Up Committee for the Arab Population of Israel, despite the fact that the state doesn’t recognize it de-jure, it does de-facto. This committee represents the elected persons from the Arab public in Israel. The organization was founded in 1977, not for the purpose of threatening the existence of the state.

It is important to mention that the document comes from the basic position of our citizenship in the state, not from anywhere else. When you talk of solution and arrangement of the relations in this state our point of departure is consensual democracy. As a minority we will defend ourselves. We have every reason to believe that we would like to reach our hand out to the Jewish public both to protect ourselves, and to participate in defining the vision of how this state should look, and that it will be democratic. The Arab population will not concede this. If we will continue things as they are today, the oppression of civil rights, which means that we are not living in a democratic society, will continue. It is worth it to create a debate not only between Jewish elites to the Arab populace, but between Jewish and Arab elites.