Paper short abstract:

During the Covid-19 pandemic, governmental policies had a special effect on the native population of Bedouins in the Negev Desert of southern Israel. We aim to address how these communities were affected, how they adapted, and then compare them to similar ones in African drylands.

Paper long abstract:

Over the last century, different economic and social pressures have increasingly forced the once-nomadic Bedouin people to establish fixed settlements. Maintaining a unique identity separate from other Islamic or Arabic cultures, many Bedouins still keep herd animals, socialize in traditional tents, and organize their society around extended families, known as clans.

Before the Covid-19 pandemic, the many Bedouins, who are settled in Israel’s Negev Desert, lived away from the wider Israeli society, but close to their traditional ways of life. Once the pandemic began, the social and economic rift between these societies expanded.

There were many instances in which government institutions failed to appreciate the position of the Bedouin people, who due to the unrecognized status of their villages often live without modern infrastructure. Then, due to this oversight, many pandemic policies only left them further behind. We aim in our paper to discuss the ways that the Covid-19 pandemic affected this unique population. We will discuss the shortcomings of the Covid-19 response, as well as the community's internal assets, which made the Bedouins more adaptable on the whole in the face of the pandemic. Then having informed ourselves of their special case, we apply the lessons learned to other similar populations, especially those in African drylands.