Druze in Israel

Israeli Druze or Druze Israelis (Arabic: الدروز الإسرائيليون; Hebrew: דְּרוּזִים יִשְׂרְאֵלִים) are an ethnoreligious minority among the Arab citizens of Israel.

In 2019, there were 143,000 Druze people living within Israel and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, comprising 1.6% of the total population of Israel.

Although Druzism, their ethnic religion, originally developed out of Ismaʿilism (a branch of Shia Islam), the Druze do not consider themselves Muslims. In 1957, the Israeli government designated Druze Israelis as a distinct ethnic community at the request of Druze communal leaders. Alongside the Jewish majority and the Circassian minority, the Druze minority is required by law to serve in the Israel Defense Forces, and members of the community have also attained top positions in Israeli politics and public service. As is the case for the Circassian community, only men from the community are drafted, while women are exempted; in contrast with Jews, for whom military service is also mandatory for women.

Before the Israeli Declaration of Independence, Druze people were not recognized as a religious community, and were discriminated against by the local judicial system. Druze Israelis are native Arabic-speakers; a 2017 poll conducted by the Pew Research Center reported that the majority of Israel's Druze also ethnically self-identify as Arabs. Israel has the world's third-largest Druze population, after Syria and Lebanon; the majority of Druze Israelis are concentrated in northern Israel.