What would you have done?

There is a television show on Channel 2 called "Ma atem haitem osim? (?מה אתם הייתם עושים), which basically means "What would you have done?" It is a show that tests the civil courage in the Israeli population. Hidden cameras are observing how people are reacting when actors are staging different disturbing situations. Last nights subject was racism, and a guy working in a gas station continuously refused to serve an Arab woman wearing a hijab. 53% of the customers intervened in some way, everything from trying to buy the things for the Arab woman, to refusing themselves to make business with this racist guy, and many also protested loudly. 42% stayed indifferent and 5% actually agreed with the man behind the counter. Of course you can never know that was going on in the mind of the indifferent 42%, but expecting all of them to giving a quiet consent is not reasonable. I think that there were a fair amount that also dissented, but chose not to intervene for whatever reason.

For those who blindly trust the image of Israel and Israelis that is delivered by media in Europe, it is easy to believe that Israelis are a homogenous bunch of Arab-haters, but nothing could be more untrue. One fifth of the Israeli population consists of Arabs, and although racism and discrimination of course occur, just like in any other country, if you pick anyone Israeli off the street, the chance is very high that it is an open-minded and non-prejudice person. Then putting this in the context of a long history of terror-attacks from Arab extremists, I find it pretty noticeable that so many people avoid becoming arabophobic.

Sadly, I don't think that the results would have been much different, had the experiment been performed in Sweden. Instead, I think that the level of indifference would have been even higher. Swedes are taught to mind their own business, while Israelis do meddle in everything around them. Considering the circumstances, I think that the Israelis passed this test with good results.