The initial election night triumph for Palestinian citizens of Israel—where Arab-led parties secured a record 19 seats—quickly dissolved into a week of delegitimising rhetoric from Israeli politicians. Nearly 840,000 ballots were cast for Ra’am and the Joint List, marking a 64 percent surge compared to 2022. Adding these legislators to opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot’s bloc could have theoretically forged a 67-seat anti-Netanyahu coalition. However, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party alleged that the election was allegedly “stolen” through purported Qatari financing, claims that were subsequently unsupported by police sources and election officials who confirmed the voting was conducted properly.

This delegitimisation has directly bled into ongoing coalition negotiations. Avigdor Lieberman, leader of the right-wing Yisrael Beytenu party, has firmly ruled out any partnership with Palestinian factions, while Eisenkot has laid down stringent conditions that remain fundamentally unacceptable to Arab lawmakers, including the demand to recognize Israel as a “Jewish, democratic, liberal, and egalitarian state.” Despite this hostile political climate, thousands gathered in Tel Aviv advocating for an inclusive coalition that incorporates parties representing Palestinian citizens.

Meanwhile, Palestinians across the occupied West Bank have endured relentless military sieges and operations, most notably in Hebron. By late October, the closure of multiple entrances displaced thousands, led to mass detentions, and inflicted millions of shekels in daily economic losses on a city vital to Palestinian industrial output. Compounding these hardships, United Nations monitors documented an unprecedented spike in settler violence disrupting the crucial olive harvest, leaving local farmers cut off from water, food, and their livelihoods. *

In the Gaza Strip, relentless daily bombardments persist, with UN human rights offices warning that civilians are continually compressed into shrinking zones. The Israeli regime has asserted that many casualties were allegedly Hamas combatants, though verifiable evidence has routinely been omitted. As winter approaches, the humanitarian crisis deepens drastically: hospitals face imminent collapse due to acute fuel shortages, and tens of thousands of displaced families languish in makeshift tents amid severe entry restrictions on vital relief supplies.

Source: www.aljazeera.com