Haaretz reporter Jack Khoury reported on Thursday that the Arab parties' leaders plan to call on their potential voters not to boycott the upcoming election but to go out and vote, despite the expected disqualification of Sami Abu Shehadeh from running on the Joint Arab List and despite the Central Elections Committee's disqualification of the other Arab slates (which is expected to be overturned by the Supreme Court). Even if we dismiss their call as the cynicism of Knesset candidates wanting your vote, it's a call more important than ever, and I, a Jewish Zionist woman, would also like to join it.
Arab citizens' disappointment with the political establishment is understandable. One of the most common and justified arguments in this context comes from Ayman Odeh, who, as chairman of the powerful Joint List in 2019, recommended Benny Gantz for prime minister in a courageous move – the first of its kind since 1992. We know what Gantz did with those recommendations: He gave Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu his full support, and not for the first time. Odeh has spoken repeatedly since then about the disappointment that caused him, and rightly so. But what do you think: that Gantz's voters weren't disappointed by him? That the Israeli public didn't feel betrayed by someone who stole Knesset seats based on the promise and presumption of replacing Netanyahu, only to hand them to him on a silver platter along with additional years in power?
Gantz received his punishment from the universe, and we, seasoned by disappointment and experience, won't repeat that mistake. Yet we haven't boycotted any elections since. If everyone who was disappointed by Gantz's betrayal had stopped voting, Netanyahu would have 80 seats today, assuming seats were still being counted at all and a Knesset even still existed.
Gadi Eisenkot knows he has no mandate to join a government with Netanyahu no matter what. The same goes for Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid. Avigdor Liberman is an Arab-hating racist and always has been, so nothing can be expected from him; but that's precisely why he must be balanced out in the next Knesset with a large number of Arab MKs.
Journalist Mohammad Magadli published the results of a poll conducted last week among the Arab public by Statnet, according to which the expected turnout drops by more than 3 percent following the disqualification of the parties. It's unclear from the report whether this means 3 percent or three percentage points, but either way, it's a risk that can't be taken. The prevailing sentiment in the previous election was "We won't save you from yourselves; if the Jews want [National Security Minister Itamar] Ben-Gvir, they deserve Ben-Gvir." How many more bodies of Arab citizens have to be counted for you to decide that we've paid enough?
One can rightly argue the Arab public's loss of trust in elections and the political establishment also stems from their own MKs, those who cling to their seats and those who made wrong decisions and whom the party mechanism makes it very difficult to replace. It's hard to argue with that, but the alternative is still far worse. Warnings before the 2022 election fell on deaf ears – too many Arab voters thought all Zionists were the same and wondered what could possibly be worse than a government headed by a former head of the Yesha Council. The past four years have given a clear answer to that.
My Arab brothers. You're not punishing me if you don't vote, and you aren't doing me a favor if you do. You're citizens here, and your vote at the ballot box is worth just as much as mine. Actually, we should say that it's still worth as much, because another government like the present one might change that, and the power to stop it is in your hands. You're confronting a choice between a continuation of the madness or a return to sanity. Please, go out and vote. Not for me, not for you. For us, and for our shared future.
