At least two thousand people took part in a May Day parade and rally through one of Tel Aviv-Jaffa's poor southern neighborhoods on Friday, 1 May, 2009.
The participants, Israeli Arabs and Jews, called for an end to destructive economic policies advocated by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that are bolstering the upper crust of Israeli society at the expense of the poorer sectors.
Marchers included MK Dov Dov Khenin, of the Israeli Communist Party Hadash which has both Arab and Jewish representatives in the Israeli parliament. A youth drum troupe affiliated with Hadash from the northern Israeli Arab city of Umm el-Fahm also participated in the rally.
Protestors demanding "Bread! Work!" and calling for "Arab-Jewish worker unity!" and economic and workplace equality marched through the Florentin neighborhood to a central banking district on the city's Rothschild Boulevard.
Additional May Day marches and rallies were held in central Tel Aviv and in other cities around Israel.
Israel has had close ties to socialism and communism throughout its history; the kibbutz movement is socialist and Labor Zionism led first by David Ben-Gurion dominated the country though its early years. The Histadrut labor union remains a powerful force in Israeli society and politics.
(Mati Milstein is a freelance photographer and journalist based in Tel Aviv. A former chief desk editor at Haaretz.com, the website of Israel's leading daily newspaper, his work has appeared in National Geographic News, Archaeology magazine and other media outlets in Israel and abroad. He may be found on the Web at www.matimilstein.com)
