Thousands rally in Israel urging Eisenkot-Arab deal to remove Netanyahu
Thousands of people have rallied in Tel Aviv to urge the Israeli opposition to make a deal with Arab parties to remove Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Protesters at Saturday’s rally told the AFP news agency this may be the “last chance for real change” and that Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, is a “great manipulator”.
Main opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot has previously ruled out forming a coalition with Israel’s Arab parties, but a deadlock in Tuesday’s elections means siding with the parties could help him form a government.
Netanyahu’s bloc won 53 seats in Tuesday’s elections, while Eisenkot’s won 48, meaning neither side can form a government in Israel’s 120-seat parliament alone.
Arab electoral success
Israel’s three Arab-led parties won 19 seats, having made significant gains in Tuesday’s election.
Nearly 840,000 people voted for Ra’am and the Joint List, a coalition of three Arab-led parties, a 64 percent increase from the last elections in 2022, according to the Central Election Committee.
The Arab electoral success means a coalition with Eisenkot would provide a comfortable majority of 67.
Political backlash
For many in Israel, the idea of siding with Arabs is politically unpalatable. Netanyahu has accused Palestinian-Israeli parties of “stealing” the polls and accepting funding from Qatar to do it.
“Israel should not have a government with so-called terrorists”
Qatar has rejected the allegations, calling it a disinformation campaign. Israeli right-wing circles have described “the historic turnout of Palestinian Israelis as electoral terrorism, equating it to the October 7th attack”.
“Palestinian-Israeli votes and voices” are under attack because they have a “prominent position” in deciding whether Eisenkot can form a government, Al Jazeera correspondent Nour Odeh said from Ramallah on Saturday.
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