Israel’s Arab population is disproportionately young. Studies conducted elsewhere show that when a country has this type of “youth bulge” and a substantial portion of that youthful population is not in the labor market, enrolled in higher education, or married, crime rates rise. This appears to be the situation in Israel. Additionally, Arab society in Israel is confronting another major problem: education levels of young women are increasingly exceeding those of young men and this trend threatens a number of traditional marital norms in Arab society.
A new study by the Taub Center conducted by Professor Alex Weinreb focuses on the joint effects of these demographic and educational transitions, arguing that they are intensifying economic and socio-cultural forces that threaten some of the key foundations of Arab society. The rapid increase in the rate of crime in Arab society is one of the results. Yet the study predicts that in the coming decade, the same factors will drive significant changes in gender relations and in the fabric of marriage and the Arab family, factors that independently affect crime among many other things.
Unemployment, a lack of education and a distortion of gender relations are creating social alienation in Arab society
Various studies have shown that in societies in which there has been a sharp rise in the number of young people, together with high levels of unemployment and singlehood, there is also a rise in the levels of violent crime and homicide. Ironically, the strongest effects are seen in countries in which there has been a rapid expansion of post-secondary education, since alongside growing expectations there is also increased marginalization: relatively uneducated individuals are often shunted aside.
This characterizes the situation of Arab men in Israel. Arab men have particularly high rates of unemployment and underemployment, as well as low participation levels in higher education and other systems, such as national and military service. In fact, their rates of employment have been falling. During the two years prior to the Corona crisis, Arab men’s employment rates fell by 7 percentage points among 15–24-year olds and 25–34-year-olds. The main reason: a poor match between their skills and the needs of the labor market. Of course, not all the news is gloomy. From the perspective of education, the proportion of Arab men in their 30s who have an academic degree has grown in recent decades to 18%, which is higher than among ultra-Orthodox Jewish men (11%). Yet this is still significantly lower than levels among non-ultra-Orthodox Jewish men (47%) and barely half that of young Arab women (35%).
Moreover, in view of the generally poor achievements of young Arab men on the PISA tests and the matriculation exams on average, they receive significantly lower scores than Jews and Arab women, Arab men’s prospects for future success in the labor market are also not very bright. The overall picture of younger Arab Israelis that emerges from these trends is of an increasingly educated minority that is disproportionately female, alongside an ill-educated majority that is disproportionately male. This second group is exactly the population most prone to triggering sociopolitical instability.
The number of homicides in Arab society has doubled in the last decade. The light at the end of the tunnel: expected demographic changes
Between 2011 and 2016, the number of homicides in the Arab population in Israel was about 60 per year. The number exceeded 90 in 2019, 100 in 2020, and has already passed 120 in 2021. In other words, the number of homicides has more than doubled in 5 years, and it now accounts for 80% of all homicides in Israel, up from 40% in 2011. Signs of this can also be seen in national survey data. The share of Arab adults reporting feeling a lack of personal security in their neighborhood at night rose from about 25% in 2003 to 35% in 2019. During the same period the share among Jewish adults fell from 25% to 17%.
The new study by the Taub Center, which was carried out by Professor Alex Weinreb, a demographer, analyzed the relationship between the rate of growth in the number of males aged 18–22 and both the rate of homicide and self-reported feeling of personal security.
Results pointed to a statistically significant positive correlation between the annual rate of growth in the population of young Arab men and the rate of homicide, but only among Arabs—a negative correlation was found among Jews. They also pointed to a positive relationship between trends in the growth of the young population and the general index of personal security, though, again, this was only the case among Israeli Arabs.
To the extent that demography is pushing these trends, there is some room for hope since we are now living through a significant slowdown in the number of young Arab Israelis reaching their late teens. In 2020–21, the rate of growth of the Arab 18–22 age group was less than 2%. By 2023 it is expected to drop below zero and to remain there until 2028 and subsequently to rise to 1% by 2036. During this period, there is an opportunity to invest in the social integration of this age group and to bring about a significant decline in the crime rate. However, changes in the Arab marriage market are working to offset this positive trend.
Educated Arab women are generating a revolution and the institution of marriage in Arab society is being undermined
The Arab population, both in Israel and in other countries, is considered to be conservative when it comes to marriage and sex. In 2020, only 4.5% of Muslim men aged 45–49 were single, as opposed to 11% of women and there was almost no fertility outside of marriage. Until roughly 20 years ago, most Arab women were married by their early 20s to men who were both more educated and older than they were—the average age difference between husbands and wives in Israeli Arab families is six years. The growing gap in educational attainment, alongside other cultural changes in Arab society that have pushed up women’s age at marriage, clearly makes this long-term pattern unsustainable.
In this new situation, which is connected to that same “youth bulge” that raises the crime rate, the number of men and women aged 20 is larger than any of the age groups younger than them. Given the accepted age gap between a husband and wife in Arab society, this means that starting from 2026 the number of men at the normative age of marriage for Arab men will be about 5–10% greater than the number of women at the normative age of marriage for Arab women. This is in fact an underestimate of the excess of men on the marriage market, since it does not take into account—due to a lack of precise data—the effects of polygyny on the “supply” of women in the marriage market, which is common primarily among Bedouins. Nor does it account for the effect of the rise in the level of education among Arab women on their willingness and readiness to marry. Even without polygyny, however, this appears to be a truly new challenge to Arab marital patterns. We do not know of any prior time when an Arab society has had to confront this problem of excess men.
Arab society will have to deal with the changes taking place simultaneously in its age profile and its educational characteristics. The rate of labor force participation among Arab women is lower than among Jewish women and tends to decline after marriage and giving birth. On the assumption that the increase in the level of education will encourage Arab women to work, it can be expected that they will achieve additional economic independence and greater freedom to choose whether or not to marry, when to marry and how to live their lives. In Israel, this growing independence can already be seen in the rise in age at marriage, in the increased number of young Arab couples living in non-mixed cities, such as Nof HaGalil, Carmiel, Arad and Beer Sheva, and in the increase in divorce rates. Between 2004 and 2019, the rate of divorce grew by more than 50% among Muslims and Druze and even more than that among Christians. In addition, there is also a phenomenon—though still quite marginal—of Arab women, mostly well-educated Christians, who choose to marry non-Arab Israelis.
Marriage patterns among men in Arab society are also expected to change in view of the relative scarcity of women and their growing independence. It may be that some of these Arab men will find brides in other, more impoverished Arab societies, such as the West Bank or Jordan, although it is not clear whether this will be possible given the nationalistic-political tensions being generated by the family unification law. Similarly, it is also unclear how much this phenomenon can solve the overall problem since it may also lead to a flow of brides in the opposite direction. Here, too, another possibility is an increase in mixed marriages between Arab men and Israeli non-Arab women.
Overall, it is difficult to predict how the increasing educational advantage of Arab women over Arab men will express itself. New research in Israel points to Arab women’s growing frustration due to the difficulty in combining a job and housework, and it is likely that this will exacerbate the tension between them and men with less education. There are signs that the educational advantage of women in Israeli Arab society is having both positive and negative effects. It is also likely that over time there will be a reframing of gender expectations to allow for more women’s autonomy.
“The increase in the rate of violent crime in Arab society is a worrying phenomenon by all accounts, but its roots need to be understood in order to know how to deal with it. There are many changes occurring in Arab society today, some of which are being led by educated Arab women, and their effect will be felt slowly, from the bottom up. At the same time, we cannot ignore the growing alienation among some young men in this society. It should be a cause of worry for us all, and the increasing mismatches between men and women in the local Israeli Arab marriage market in the coming years will exacerbate that alienation. Luckily, as growth comes to an end in the younger segments of the Arab population we will have a demographic window of opportunity to prepare for the coming years and to reduce the effects of other factors that drive the crime rate; however, this will require proactive policy,” according to Professor Alex Weinreb.
The Taub Center for Social Policy Studies in Israel is an independent, non-partisan socioeconomic research institute. The Center provides decision makers and the public with research and findings on some of the most critical issues facing Israel in the areas of education, health, welfare, labor markets and economic policy in order to impact the decision-making process in Israel and to advance the well-being of all Israelis.