This article seeks to demonstrate how discriminatory laws, passed in Israel since the eruption of the second intifada, are part of an ongoing securitization process of the Palestinian minority in Israel. These discriminatory laws serve as part of a security practice, employed by political elites that seek to represent threats to the hegemony of the Jewish identity as existential to national security. In doing so, the Israeli authorities advance a national security policy that perpetuates the perceived threat posed to the state by the Palestinian minority. The analysis focuses on discriminatory legislation passed between 2000 and 2012 by the Israeli Knesset and the political attitudes of the Israeli public before and after the second intifada to uncover the ways in which political actors and audiences negotiate the meaning of security in Israel. Securitization theory helps explain why desecuritization of the minority is highly unlikely even in the event that the Israeli–Palestinian conflict will be resolved.
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