Hidden and manifested authority abuse: Sexual misconduct of female Arabs by Jewish males in the Israeli academia

Abstract

For female Arab student citizens of Israel, Israeli academia can become a violently unsafe site that reflects its racist reality. Our article addresses stories told by two Arab-Palestinian female students about sexual misconduct they experienced from Jewish males. Reading these stories through critical race theory, intersectionality and settler colonialism theory, we argue that these cases echo and represent the unequal gender, ethnic and national power relations in Israeli society. In the first account, a female Arab student was offered academic help by one of her Jewish male peers, which quickly turned into a case of sexual misconduct. She refused to report it, fearing social sanctions. In the second story, the student experienced forced courtship by a member of staff but did not file a complaint fearing to jeopardise the services she was entitled to. In both stories, the Jewish men were aware of and exploited the patriarchal and national oppression faced by the Arab female students. We argue that the victims’ wish to hide the sexual offences is both a result of their lack of agency in the face of Israeli racist and colonial discourse and an act of resistance against that discourse.