Hundreds of Israelis demonstrated in Tel Aviv on Saturday, urging the opposition to join forces with Arab parties to remove Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu from power. The protest followed elections on Tuesday in which no bloc won a majority in the 120-seat Knesset. Netanyahu, meanwhile, stepped up his attacks on leaders of Israel’s Arab minority.
Parties opposed to Netanyahu that draw most of their support from Jewish voters won 48 seats. The Arab-majority Ra’am and Joint List parties won 19 seats combined. An alliance between the two groups would hold 67 seats, a clear majority, but some opposition parties oppose working with Arab parties.
Gadi Eisenkot, the opposition leader, has not decided whether to accept such an alliance. He has said he would form only a “Zionist government” whose members recognize Israel as a Jewish, democratic and liberal state and regard Hamas as a terrorist organization—conditions Arab leaders have rejected in the past. Eisenkot said he did not want to depend on Arab parties, but did not explicitly rule out their support.
The Arab parties have joined a government once before: Ra’am leader Mansur Abbas was part of a short-lived coalition from 2021 to 2022 and has said he is willing to do so again. Joint List leader Yusef Jabareen told AFP he would be prepared to support Eisenkot in parliament without joining the government.
Around 500 people attended the Tel Aviv protest, with banners reading “Arabs and Jews win together” and “There is a majority for change.” Ayelet Raz, a 60-year-old psychologist at the rally, said Israel’s Arab community, which makes up about 20% of the population, had the right to take part in government. She described the election as a final opportunity for real change and said the country needed to give peace a chance. More than 100 Netanyahu supporters held a separate demonstration.
President Isaac Herzog is expected to ask either Netanyahu or Eisenkot on Thursday to try to form a new government.
As political negotiations continued, Israeli strikes in Gaza killed eight people, including a child, on Sunday, according to local emergency services and hospitals. Gaza’s Civil Defense said five died in Khan Yunis and three in Gaza City. The territory’s Interior Ministry said Israeli aircraft had struck police officers on duty in Khan Yunis.
The Israeli military told AFP it had attacked “a terrorist” in southern Gaza and “several others” in the north, adding that it was assessing the results of the strikes. Israel launched its military offensive after Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack in Israel, which killed 1,200 people. The offensive has displaced nearly Gaza’s entire population. Gaza’s Health Ministry reports more than 74,500 deaths; the United Nations considers the figures reliable.
Sources: Folha Mundo.