Knesset holds first spoken Arabic course for lawmakers

Seventeen lawmakers attended the inaugural lesson on Tuesday of the first-ever spoken Arabic course to be offered in the Knesset.

The course, a joint initiative of MKs Basel Ghattas of the Joint (Arab) List and Nurit Koren of Likud, was approved by Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein.

The first lesson was attended by representatives of almost all of the Knesset’s 10 factions.

In a Facebook post Tuesday, Koren detailed her role in the initiative’s development: “A few months ago, I brought the attention of the Knesset speaker and the Knesset secretary to the fact that often Knesset members from the Joint List speak Arabic in the plenum, and I, as the plenum chair, cannot understand the language,” she wrote.

“I proposed that Knesset members undergo a course in spoken Arabic, the second official language in Israel, so that we can understand what our colleagues are saying, but especially because it is an important language and it is important that every citizen of the state know it,” Koren wrote.

In his opening address to the participants in the meeting, Ghattas explained his support for the initiative. “The Arabic language is an official language [in Israel] and needs to be taught everywhere, and of course in the parliament, in which there is a whole list, the third-largest in the Knesset, which speaks Arabic,” he was quoted by the Maariv news site as saying.

Ghattas told the site that he hoped the course would “help to improve the communication between MKs, especially for those who are angered when we speak Arabic in the plenum. And if they won’t turn into [fluent] Arabic speakers after the course, I hope that they will at least begin to pronounce our names correctly,” he added.

Ghattas gained notoriety in October for defying a ban by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Arab and Jewish Knesset members from visiting Jerusalem’s Temple Mount. An Arab Christian, Ghattas said at the time that his visit to the site, holy to both Jews and Muslims, was in protest of Israel’s alleged plans — vociferously denied — to change the status quo at the site.

In late October, a bill mandating Israeli schools to teach Arabic from the first grade, sponsored by Likud MK Oren Hazan, gained preliminary approval in the Ministerial Committee for Legislation. A subsequent Knesset vote advanced the bill into committee, where it currently sits.

Education Minister Naftali Bennett has voiced support for the bill.