No more than one wife: Israel looks to tackle Bedouin polygamy

On Hadra al-Faqira’s wedding anniversary, just weeks after she gave birth to a daughter, her husband walked out and took a second wife.

She hasn’t seen him since he moved down the road in their dusty Bedouin town and started a new family, with seven more children.

“I can’t bear the thought of her,” al-Faqira said of the second wife. “He destroyed my household when he started another.”

Although Israel outlawed polygamy decades ago, it’s widespread in the impoverished Bedouin sector.

Israel is now trying to end the old custom, for the first time prosecuting suspected Bedouin polygamists. But many Bedouin, who complain of systematic neglect and discrimination by successive Israeli governments, see only a ploy to curb their population growth and criminalize their community members.

Justice Ministry Director-General Emi Palmor, who spearheads the campaign, says she’s determined to enforce the law but is trying to do so with input from the community. She said she has spent two years researching the issue and discussing solutions with Bedouin activists.

“The Bedouin community is the only place in this country where polygamy is legitimate, out loud, exposed, and no one is ashamed,” she said. “It’s a delicate issue, but it has to end.”

Critics of the campaign, including Bedouin women who oppose polygamy, mistrust the government’s motives and the timing of the campaign.

“It’s simple: polygamy means more Bedouin children, and that means more demographic concerns from a Zionist perspective,” said human rights lawyer Rawia Aburabia.

The Bedouin, descendants of nomadic tribes, are part of Israel’s Arab minority of 1.8 million, or about 20% of the population. Some 240,000 live in the Negev Desert, many in makeshift encampments lacking electricity, sewage or running water.

Around 20 to 30% of Bedouin men practice polygamy, according to government figures, with the rate climbing as high as 60% in some villages. Bedouin polygamy takes many forms, from several wives cohabitating under the same roof to men picking up and moving on to second wives without looking back.

The Bedouin are Muslims and Islam permits a man to take up to four wives, though the practice varies greatly among different Muslim communities, often depending on education and income.

Al-Faqira, 47, was married off by her family at age 16. After eight years and four children together, her husband left her, saying his family preferred he take a younger, wealthier wife. For the past decade, he has refused to see her or their children, now in their twenties, claiming they are “no longer his business,” she said.

Al-Faqira said her children have fallen into drugs and street crime. She claimed that fierce competition with her husband’s second wife has led to physical assaults on her family. Her husband’s polygamy, she said, “unleashed violence into my life.”

Polygamy has been linked to domestic violence, psychological disorders and deepening poverty. The custom has contributed to lowering Bedouin girls’ average age of marriage to 18 and driving up their school dropout and unemployment rates to 85%  and 80%, respectively, experts say.

Palmor’s committee, formed in 2016, seeks to crack down on the practice through expanded police enforcement alongside anti-polygamy education in Bedouin schools and funding for programs that boost women’s employment.

Over a dozen indictments have been issued, and in November, the first conviction for polygamy was handed down. The defense sought community service for the man, who took a second wife after his first fell ill. The prosecution is pressing for 18 months in prison. The sentence is expected soon.

Shefa al-Sana, a Bedouin social worker who helps women affected by polygamous marriages, said that despite a common goal, she doesn’t trust the government. She pulled out of Palmor’s committee, worried its emphasis on law enforcement would further marginalize the Bedouins.

“Polygamy is not a random crime. It’s a problem of ego and ignorance, men who have been stripped of their land needing women to treat as property,” she said.

Compounding suspicions has been the inclusion of Regavim, a pro-settler group invited to present research to Palmor’s committee. It has framed the fight against polygamy as a way of stemming the expansion of Bedouin villages.

Palmor dismissed accusations that her plan is politically motivated, pointing to support she has garnered from some Bedouins, most notably the human rights attorney Insaf Abu-Shareb.

Abu-Shareb has remained in Palmor’s committee, despite a backlash of Bedouins accusing her of betraying her community.

“We’ve been waiting for 70 years, and the longer the government does nothing, the harder polygamy becomes to change,” she said. “If I want the situation of Bedouin women to improve, I need to work with them.”