For his first trip away from the office, Israel's new Minister of Communication Yoaz Hendel decided to visit the Bedouin town of Tel Sheva, near Beersheba in the south of Israel. He told Al-Monitor that this was not by chance. What he wanted to show the public and himself was that one of the main goals of his tenure would be to provide rapid internet service to every person in the country, regardless of what community they belong to or where they live. This includes the Bedouin.
Infrastructure in general and internet services in particular are especially poor in the Bedouin communities of the Negev and in Israel’s Arab sector overall. A study by professor Amit Schechter of the Department of Communications at Ben Gurion University found that just 34% of homes in Bedouin towns and villages are connected to the internet, compared to 70% of Israeli society in general. In the town of Tel Sheva, which Hendel visited, the number of homes connected to the internet comes to just 10%.