Research comparing special education for Jews and for Palestinian Arabs in Israel outlines major inequalities. This situation has remained largely unchanged for decades and there is little evidential reason to believe there will be improvement in the near future. Palestinian children requiring special education are adversely affected by a combination of institutionalised discrimination and neglect and the implications of living in a traditional society that is reluctant to adopt outlooks necessary for modernising education, particularly for children with special needs. To the best of our knowledge, no overview of special education for the Palestinian minority in Israel has been published in English to date. While change is most likely to occur as a result of effective activism within the Palestinian Arab community, high rates of poverty and political marginalisation remain a daunting obstacle.