Nonetheless, virtually no majority-Jewish party at the time supported entering into a government that included Ra’am. Ultimately the scope of the crisis changed that calculation, especially when Ra’am was willing to enter the coalition as an unequal member, without any ministerial mandates for its officials; by comparison, every other party in the coalition was given control over at least three ministries. Thus, the entry of the first Arab party into government was facilitated by political expediency, rather than progressive politics or liberal ideals, as well as Abbas’ willingness to play along as a means to his own ends. Whether an Arab party will ever gain equal membership in government, with the corresponding ministries to show for it, is another question entirely. As long as Netanyahu’s potential return to power looms, which it has since he left office and does even more so now in light of the upcoming elections, the argument for expediency remains compelling, meaning Ra’am could get a chance to expand its influence. Yet if Netanyahu is ever removed from the political picture for good, the fissures in Israeli right-wing politics that made this experiment possible will in all likelihood disappear, no matter how much Abbas is willing to concede in return for an active role in governing. Beyond the shifting political context, it is also important to take stock of whether Ra’am was able to influence government policy from the inside, which will be critical to how the public assesses the effectiveness of its approach. In other words, was the party able to achieve what it set out to do? This, too, is up for debate. Abbas has always been clear that his decision to enter the coalition was motivated by the desire to secure tangible gains for his constituency, especially on pressing issues such as the soaring violent crime and socio-economic inequality plaguing Arab communities in Israel. During Ra’am’s time in—or adjacent to—power, the Cabinet approved important bills addressing both issues, including a five-year funding bill for socio-economic development worth roughly $9 billion. Undoubtedly, Abbas will portray these as signature achievements to burnish his reputation and validate his strategy. Yet it is not altogether certain whether these budgetary allocations were a direct result of Ra’am’s presence in the coalition. Crime in Arab communities had risen to the point of being a national concern, and there was already growing pressure on the government to address the issue. And the five-year funding bill is not the first of its kind. Rather, it comes on the heels of a similar one passed under Netanyahu in December 2015, when even segments of the Israeli right recognized that the country’s overall economic growth would stall if certain communities—namely Arabs and ultra-orthodox Jews—continued to be left behind. Thus, it’s difficult to argue that either bill is a unique achievement made possible only by Ra’am’s participation in government, or that these new funds will ever be allocated now that their sponsoring government has collapsed. At the same time, Ra’am’s participation was not without political costs, as it chose to uphold and defend a government that accelerated illegal settlement building in occupied territory, ratcheted up home demolitions and lethal violence against Palestinians, and aggravated religious tensions in Jerusalem, an issue of pressing concern to Ra’am’s religious constituency. Of course, compared to Netanyahu’s inflammatory anti-Arab rhetoric and similar policies, Ra’am could more easily justify remaining in government. In a future where Netanyahu is no longer a political force, that balance will be assessed more clearly, and the Arab public may be less forgiving of the costs of being directly associated with the policies of a right-wing government. Some analysts have argued that Ra’am’s presence in government has had a normalizing effect for the Jewish public that will make it easier for Arab parties to join future coalitions. To be sure, Bennett paid a heavy reputational price among the right wing for aligning his party with Arabs and leftists, and polling shows that right-wing voters still overwhelmingly oppose their leaders’ joining forces with Arab parties. Nevertheless, among more centrist parties, polling has shown a shift over the past year, with growing support for Arab participation in decision-making. Beyond normalization, it is likely that centrists are realizing—much like the left did in the 1990s, when then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin solicited Arab parties to support his government from outside—that they can no longer effectively contest power against the dominance of the right without building a more diverse coalition. Still, it’s hard to imagine centrist parties choosing to partner with anti-Zionist Arab parties, especially if their demands increase, over Zionist parties from the right if Netanyahu is no longer a factor. For years, a growing sense of alienation and disillusionment has spread among Palestinian citizens of Israel as their quest to make Israel a more equal society has been met with stiff resistance and a deluge of discriminatory legislation. And while Arab citizens have rallied around the mantra of transforming Israel into “a state of all its citizens,” right-wing parties made it their mission to tip Israel decisively in favor of its status as a Jewish state, codified in the 2018 Nation State Law. Moreover, the Arab public’s growing electoral power has not translated into much political influence. As a result, electoral participation has been in decline for years, and Arab politicians have scrambled to find a new way forward that galvanizes their voters. Between 2017 and 2019, the head of the Joint List, Ayman Odeh, began to chart a new path by framing his bloc as a legitimate part of the Israeli political spectrum, the inheritors of the Israeli left, and the last remaining proponents of full equality and liberal democracy. When Odeh’s appeals for Arab-Jewish partnership after the inconclusive 2020 elections were rebuffed by the center-left parties that could have formed a government with the Joint List’s support from outside, Abbas took Ra’am in a different direction, adopting a model more akin to the Haredi, or ultra-orthodox, religious parties like Shas, which have traditionally been willing to work with either side of the political spectrum as long as their parochial interests were served. For Odeh and his Joint List colleagues, this was a step too far. Now Odeh and Abbas are fighting for the minds and votes of the Arab community in Israel ahead of the next election, with four months to make their cases. The results of that ballot will be crucial for determining how Arab voters perceived Ra’am’s approach to gaining influence, but they will also signal what type of future Arab-Jewish cooperation has in Israeli politics overall.In a future where Netanyahu is no longer a political force, the Arab public may be less forgiving of a party that is directly associated with the policies of a right-wing government.
Omar H. Rahman is a fellow at the Middle East Council on Global Affairs, and formerly a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution’s Doha Center. His writing has been published in The Washington Post, Foreign Policy, The Guardian, Rolling Stone, VICE, and Al-Jazeera English, among other publications.