Skip to content

Telegraph.com

Arab Voters Hold Israel’s Balance of Power. Will Their Votes Count?

By Jaffa Levy on October 28, 2026

Listen to a Summary of This Article

Inside view of election: Exposing the Limits of Political Equality.

Seen from outside Israel, the parliamentary puzzle appears simple. If Benjamin Netanyahu cannot command a majority, his opponents can seek one with the Arab parties. Yet the Hebrew debate reveals a deeper obstacle. For important parts of the political establishment, Arab support remains something to disown, even when it could make a replacement government possible.

The provisional count illustrates the dilemma. Calcalist reported at 12:46 on 28 October that, with 77.6% of votes counted, Netanyahu’s bloc had 54 seats, the competing opposition bloc 49, and the Arab parties 17. Those figures could change. But they expose the immediate question: can opponents of Netanyahu assemble a governing agreement across the Jewish and Arab divide?

THE POPULATION

About 2.15 million Arab residents, approximately 22% of Israel’s population excluding foreign residents, according to official figures for the end of 2025.

Arab citizens comprise approximately 18% of eligible voters living in Israel. Population includes children and residents without voting rights, so these percentages measure different things.

Forty nine seats plus seventeen make sixty six. That is a potential parliamentary majority, not an agreed coalition. Arab parties have their own programmes, while important Jewish opposition leaders have promised to reject their participation.

The resulting deadlock is partly manufactured by those promises. An opposition can reject Netanyahu and simultaneously impose conditions that prevent it from replacing him.

THE SEATS AND THE TRADITION

2022: Ra’am and Hadash Ta’al won 10 seats combined.

2026 provisional count: 17 seats combined, comprising 11 for the Joint List and six for Ra’am, in the Calcalist update at 12:46 on 28 October, after 77.6% of votes were counted.

The prevailing tradition has been to govern without depending on independent Arab parties. Important exceptions were Rabin’s reliance on outside Arab support after 1993 and Ra’am’s formal coalition membership in 2021.

Seats belong to political lists. These figures are not a count of every Arab parliamentarian or every Arab voter’s choice.

The political mood cannot be reduced to a single national emotion. The sources show fear, hostility, defiance and a competing demand for partnership.

In a public X statement dated 15 October, reproduced by N12, Avigdor Liberman rejected any minority government, including a temporary one. He excluded Ra’am and the Joint List, alongside the ultra Orthodox parties, and suggested that Likud without Netanyahu could be a partner.

This matters because the barrier does not come solely from Netanyahu’s camp. A major figure seeking his removal has restricted the most obvious alternative parliamentary arrangement.

Yair Golan argues the opposite. In an X post reported on election morning, he called for cooperation with Arab citizens and rejected the distinction between the political value of Jewish and Arab votes. His seat arithmetic reflected an earlier provisional picture. His central argument concerned equal citizenship.

The two positions reveal an opposition divided over what political change requires.

THE POLLING: HOW STRONG IS THE TABOO?

2025 Democracy Index: the Israel Democracy Institute reported that 71.5% of Jewish respondents opposed bringing Arab parties into government. Support varied sharply: 69% on the Jewish left, 26% in the centre, and 7% on the right supported inclusion.

October 2026 survey: a clear majority of Jewish respondents rejected involvement by either Ra’am or the Joint List, including outside parliamentary support. Opposition was stronger towards the Joint List.

The important qualification: in the institute’s December 2025 deadlock question, 64.5% of Jewish opposition voters accepted cooperation with Ra’am, through participation or outside support.

These are different questions and electorates. Together they establish a powerful barrier, not universal rejection or inevitable electoral ruin for every party accepting Arab support.

The phrase “unthinkable coalition” captures an influential political attitude. It is not a complete description of public opinion. For substantial parts of the Jewish electorate, partnership is acceptable, particularly with Ra’am. For others, opposition extends even to support from outside.

The distinction is crucial for an observer abroad. Jewish Israelis are not the whole Israeli electorate. Describing Jewish opposition as the opinion of all Israelis erases the Arab citizens whose political rights are at issue.

Israeli bloggers also challenge the assumption that exclusion is inevitable. Writing in Zman Yisrael’s blog section in April, Yanal Jabareen criticised the gulf between opposition rhetoric about unity and its rejection of Arab partners. His argument identifies exclusion as a choice made by leaders claiming to offer renewal.

In a February blog, Nadav Tamir described a joint Jewish and Arab demonstration against violence and argued that democratic renewal required partnership. This is evidence of an organised alternative mood, rather than proof of a national consensus.

A contrasting response appears in Makor Rishon. Elyashiv Reichner interprets Arab electoral leverage as pressure on the Jewish blocs to form a broad unity government. From outside, the implication is revealing: increased Arab representation can become an argument for Jewish parties to reconcile with one another rather than negotiate with Arab representatives.

The liberal press identifies the fear underpinning this situation. In December 2025, Zman Yisrael commentator Shalom Yerushalmi described Eisenkot confronting the practical need for Arab votes while recoiling from the label of a minority government dependent on Arabs. The difficulty, in this reading, lies as much in the feared accusation as in coalition arithmetic.

Haaretz’s accessible Hebrew election headlines likewise urge opposition courage and warn against repudiating the Arab electoral achievement. Direct access to the full articles was blocked, so those headlines should not be presented as a complete account of their arguments.

The mood among Arab voters has its own priorities. Calcalist’s Tzvi Zrahiya identifies organised crime, fear of another term under Itamar Ben Gvir, and rejection of electoral abstention as important sources of mobilisation.

Writing in Ynet, Rawia Handaklu warns that the wish to remove Netanyahu does not give his opponents unconditional Arab support. Participation expresses a demand for influence over policy and the distribution of power.

The Joint List’s reported demands make that concrete: action against criminal organisations, changes to planning enforcement, opportunities for young people, and a political horizon for negotiations with Palestinian leaders. These are negotiating positions, not simply an offer to supply votes.

This exposes a weakness in descriptions of the Arab parties as “kingmakers”. The term suggests that their principal function is to choose which Jewish politician governs. Their voters may reasonably expect something more: negotiated commitments, resources and a recognised share of influence.

The historical record also limits sweeping claims. Rabin initially formed a majority government with Labour, Meretz and Shas in 1992. After Shas left in 1993, outside support from Hadash and the Arab Democratic Party sustained it. In 2021, Ra’am signed a formal coalition agreement and joined the coalition supporting Bennett and Lapid.

That coalition later fell and Bennett’s party disintegrated. These outcomes help explain political anxiety, but do not establish Arab participation as their sole cause. Eight factions, a narrow majority and defections also shaped the government’s fate.

There are legitimate arguments against particular partnerships. Parties can disagree over security, national identity, religion and Palestinian statehood. A workable government requires commitments beyond a shared wish to remove one leader. But such differences need to be examined rather than assumed from the ethnicity of a party’s electorate.

The evidence supports a sharper criticism than a claim about universal hatred. Arab participation faces widespread opposition, and that opposition is reinforced by political promises that restrict coalition negotiations before they begin. Yet there are voters, bloggers and politicians willing to challenge it.

The question is whether their leaders will defend a negotiated agreement when opponents attack it. Arab parties can hold the parliamentary balance and still find their influence blocked by the parties that need their support.

Viewed from abroad, that is the test this election exposes: whether equal votes can produce an equal opportunity to shape government.

Sources