Talking about occupation, Israel’s Ministry of Labor said that data released by Israel Central Bureau of Statistics showed the employment rate among women in Arab society increased from 42.1% at the beginning of 2022, to 44.7% at the beginning of this year.
Compared to 2019, before the outbreak of the Covid epidemic, there was an increase of 8% in the employment rate among Arab women, from 36.7% in 2019, to 44.7% in the first half of this year. Similarly, the employment rate of men in Arab society increased from 72.1% in the first half of 2022, to 76.4% in the first half of 2023.
These increases were connected to the Israeli government’s five-year program that supports the promotion in Arab communities, various ways to increase employment, such as, in the field of occupational guidance, the promotion of professional and technological training, the development of high-tech fields, assistance in the promotion of skills and knowledge of the Hebrew language, and the provision of grants to companies in the private sector to encourage employment.
In the past year alone, for example, the Ministry of Labor increased the number of Arab-Israelis learning Hebrew under its auspices to 5,100 (an increase of 60%) with 75% graduating successfully compared to 67% in 2021. This is alongside the expansion of the training system and the development of a free digital course for learning the Hebrew language.
