Ra’am MK Said al-Harumi, a champion of Negev Bedouin, dies at 49

Ra’am MK Said al-Harumi died early Wednesday after being rushed to Soroka hospital in Beersheba after suffering a heart attack, the party announced. He was 49.

Al-Harumi, along with his fellow lawmakers from the Islamist Ra’am party, made history this year when they became the first Arab party to join a governing coalition.

“May God have mercy on our Said and accompany him in peace,” Ra’am said in a statement announcing his death. “Condolences to his family and the people of the Negev.”

Party chief Mansour Abbas said al-Harumi was a “young, smart, energetic politician.”

“He always believed in his path as a son of the Negev Arabs. The loss is great,” Abbas said.

Al-Harumi hailed from the Bedouin heartland in the Negev Desert, where tens of thousands of people live in unrecognized villages that are largely cut off from basic services and where homes and other structures have been built without legal permits, putting them at risk of demolition by Israeli authorities.

Al-Harumi has spent years negotiating with the government to recognize some of the Bedouin villages and had hoped that the controversial decision to enter the government would advance their cause.

However, the MK surprised observers earlier this year when he refused to vote with the rest of his party on a confidence motion that installed the new government, replacing Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu after over a decade in power. The move came in response to the planned demolitions of Bedouin homes in the Negev, which he opposes.

Ra’am chief Mansour Abbas later said al-Harumi’s protest vote was coordinated in advance and that coalition leaders Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid had been aware of it. In addition, he said al-Harumi had been ready to back the government if there had been any chance it would not pass the vote.

He also assured his coalition allies that al-Harumi would fall in line and vote with the party in the future.

He was later appointed chairman of the Knesset Interior Committee.

In recent years, Israel has sought to relocate the Bedouin to established towns, saying it would allow the state to provide modern services and improve their quality of life. The Bedouin view such efforts as a way of uprooting them from their ancestral lands, disrupting their traditional way of life and confining them to impoverished, crime-ridden communities.

“I want the Arab Bedouin of the Negev to choose their way of life,” he said in a recent interview. “Those who want to live a traditional, agricultural life as Bedouin should have the opportunity to do so on their own land. What’s the problem?”

Al-Harumi said he hoped to benefit his people by engaging with wider Israeli society and joining the government,

“It’s an experiment,” al-Harumi said. “Can we influence the government to benefit our society and exploit the political conditions that exist, or do we keep to ourselves. The easiest thing is to stay back and say I won’t get involved.”

Tal Schneider contributed to this report