Israel Announce LGBT Shelters for Israeli Arab Youth

HAIFA, ISRAEL — (02-06-22) — Knesset Member Ibtisam Mara’ana (Labor),  hopes the announcement of the first ever LGBT Shelter for Israeli Youth will ‘break taboos’ that have long lived in the great state of Israel.

According to Knesset Member Ibtisam Mara’ana, two centers for LGBT Arab Israeli adults are set to open in Haifa to help Arab youth in need of emergency housing.

Knesset Member Ibtisam Mara’ana (Labor), who pushed for the youth center, said that she decided to launch the LGBT Shelters after speaking to members of the LGBT Arab community and asking them where they felt their needs were not being met.

“The unequivocal answer that I received was that there is a lack of a framework for emergency shelter, as well as transitional living centers for LGBT minors and youth from the Arab sector,” Mara’ana told The Media Line. “I’m the first and only Arab Knesset member to embrace the LGBT community, even before I was elected to the Knesset.”

“The unequivocal answer that I received was that there is a lack of a framework for emergency shelter, as well as transitional living centers for LGBT minors and youth from the Arab sector,” Mara’ana told The Media Line. “I’m the first and only Arab Knesset member to embrace the LGBT community, even before I was elected to the Knesset.”

The goal is to ensure that Arab Israeli youth “feel comfortable having youth guides speaking their language,” said Mara’ana..

Conservative Knesset Member Walid Taha (Ra’am) however, attacked Mara’ana in response to the announcement of the new youth shelter and vowed that he would not allow such a place to open. (In typical right wing conservatives ideology form!)

“As an Arab woman in your party, Ibtisam, you would do better to deal with the burning issues facing Arab society,” said Taha. “People in Arab society, Ms. Ibtisam, keep their religion and values and do not agree that a man should wed another man, and a woman [be with] another woman.” said Taha.

Keshet dismissed Taha’s comments and said that the legislator was disconnected from reality since the new shelters have nothing to do with gay marriage.

Mara’ana also said that the two adult shelters in Haifa will provide transitory flats for at-risk Arab LGBT people.

Article by: Paul Goldberg, Staff Writer

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