As major maneuvers multiply ahead of the elections in Israel within the Zionist opposition, one theme unites them (excluding Yair Golan’s left-wing party “The Democrats”): the refusal to govern with Arab parties.
Besides making the formation of a coalition requiring more than 61 deputies very unlikely in view of the polls, this marks a shift compared to the experience of governments led by Naftali Bennett and then Yair Lapid between 2021 and 2022.
While acknowledging his previous choice to govern with them, Bennett, among others, justified this reversal by the terrorist attack of October 7, which would explain the reluctance of the Israeli people to support such a configuration today.
This ostracism is both a capitulation to the far Right, which continues to demonize Israeli Arabs and warn against such an alliance, and a tremendous gift to extremists within Israeli Arab society who warn against any integration into the Israeli political game.
Coalition vs opposition
Extremely unpopular since October 7, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his partners are consistently projected to be defeated in voting intentions by the opposition (Zionist parties and Arab parties). Polls consistently grant 50-52 seats to the outgoing coalition and 58-60 to the opposition Zionist parties.
In fact, Netanyahu’s goal is less about winning the election than not losing it, by keeping the Zionist opposition below the 61-seat mark.
His other related objective, hammered home continuously, is to make any alliance with Arab parties unacceptable.
This is to prevent it from forming a government and allowing him to remain in power at the helm of a caretaker government, as he did between 2019 and 2021, when four successive elections ended in a stalemate with no 61-seat majority emerging from them.
This attitude by Bennett, Lapid, or Gadi Eisenkot plays into Netanyahu’s strategy. It reflects a caution bordering on cowardice and is an insult to Israeli Arabs who sincerely want to participate in integrating into Israeli society.
An insulting and racist attitude
As for the argument about October 7, it is as absurd as it is insulting. Absurd because Arabs were also victims of the Hamas terrorist attack, and some Israeli Arab politicians have supported the families of hostages far more than Israeli government ministers.
It is insulting because it implicitly equates every Arab with Hamas terrorists, similar to antisemites who portray Jews worldwide as “genocidal Zionists and Netanyahu’s henchmen” (without equating Netanyahu and Hamas, of course).
Above all, it is a complete misunderstanding of the evolution of Israeli society. The caution of Bennett or Lapid is indeed contrary to the profound changes in the place of Israeli Arabs and their growing integration into Israeli society.
Contrary to obsessive critics of the Hebrew state, Israel is not an apartheid society. First, because Arabs have the right to vote and be elected, and second, because they also represent 25% of doctors, 50% of pharmacists, and nearly 20% of higher education graduates in Israel (this last percentage aligns with their demographic weight in Israel).
The glass ceiling is, therefore, more political than societal, despite the persistence of racism and mistrust among some Israeli Jews. The role of Israeli Jewish politicians should be to accompany this evolution, not to reject it toward civic secession, and to push for a true partnership with them.
This is not only the only electoral strategy to defeat the ruling coalition but also – and above all – the way to symbolically turn the page on the current government, the most extremist in the country’s history, and open a new chapter in Israel’s history.
This chapter would be one of civic partnership between Jews and Arabs. It would honor Israel’s Declaration of Independence, which wished to ensure “complete equality of social and political rights to all its citizens, without distinction of belief, race or sex.”
Netanyahu has always known how to surf on others’ fears to conquer power and stay there. He fully intends to renew this approach for these elections, which should mark his repudiation after the catastrophic failure of October 7.
Likely unable to win, he wants to prevent his opposition from doing so. It is up to the latter to avoid the traps set by a man who may be a poor geopolitical strategist but remains a master of political tactics.
Born and raised in France, the writer is the correspondent of French Jewish radio, Radio J, and of the French paper librejournal.fr in the US, where he has been living for 16 years. He is also a contributor to the European Review UK. He holds US and Israeli citizenship. His opinions are his own.