How the Gaza war affects Israel’s minorities in different ways

About a quarterIDFIDF of the population of the world’s only Jewish state are not Jewish. The different experiences of Israel’s minorities during the war in Gaza highlight the complexities of their position.It was impossible, on November 19th, to drive through the small hillside town of Peki’in in Galilee. Blue-and-white Israeli flags and the multicoloured banners of the Druze flew side-by-side on lamp-posts on the winding street leading to the main square and its statue of a mustachioed Druze warrior. Thousands had come to pay their last respects to Major Jamal Abbas, a 23-year-old paratrooper in the Israel Defence Forces () who was killed in action. In the heartland of Israel’s Druze community, which numbers 150,000, half a dozen military funerals have been held since October 7th. The ’s highest-ranking officer killed in the ground campaign inside Gaza was a Druze. Over 80% of Israel’s Druze men enlist, many in combat units.