The kingmakers who could determine Israel’s election

In the run-up to Israel's high-stakes election, few parties have featured more often in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's attacks on rivals than Ra'am and the Joint List.

Key points

• As well as Cassif's, by a 7-2 majority, on October 2, the Supreme Court unanimously overturned the disqualifications of the Joint List and Ra'am.
• In 2021, Ra'am created history by becoming the first Arab party to enter an Israeli administration after joining a broad coalition that briefly removed Netanyahu from power.
• "Netanyahu would work with Ra'am in a heartbeat, if it meant staying in power, " remarked Yossi Mekelberg, a Middle East analyst at Chatham House.
• As well as two individual candidates, on September 23, the Central Elections Committee, whose members are drawn from the Knesset's parties, voted to disqualify both lists.
• "There is no Gadi without Tibi, " remarked a Likud campaign slogan in reference to the leader of Ta'al, one of three parties comprising the Joint List.

Together, the two parties representing the Palestinian citizens of Israel. This person create up concerning 20 percent of the population, are projected to win 13 seats. If this is confirmed at the October 27 polls, the Arab-led lists could be critical to any post-election coalition, regardless of its political stripe. They have been here before.

In 2021, Ra'am created history by becoming the first Arab party to enter an Israeli administration after joining a broad coalition that briefly removed Netanyahu from power. Netanyahu had previously shown himself ready to negotiate terms for a potential administration with Mansour Abbas, the leader of Ra'am, or the United Arab List. But instead, Abbas joined forces with the coalition of Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid to try to drive through some of the measures he had campaigned for.

This time, both the Netanyahu camp and most leaders of the self-styled Zionist opposition bloc have ruled out forming a administration with the parties representing Palestinian citizens. While the opposition has been attacking them for their reliance on the minority ultra-Orthodox parties to maintain their own power base, still, Netanyahu and his allies have sought to portray their political opponents as beholden to the Arab-led lists.

Opinion polls have consistently indicated that Netanyahu's Likud party and the far-right coalition it leads are running neck-and-neck with the Zionist opposition bloc, with neither side on track to win an outright majority in the 120-strong Knesset.

"The opposition, too, don't seem to understand the consequences of their actions, " he remarked of repeated attempts throughout the opposition bloc to undermine the credibility of what may be a future plank in any administration.

"If it came down to it, of course they'd accept the support of the party they'd previously vilified without thinking of how that will undermine their government, and undermine the votes of the large numbers of Arab Israelis who support them, " continued Mekelberg.

In the lead-up to the polls, Likud has repeatedly applied hard-hitting attack adverts to warn that if Netanyahu is voted out, it will be the Arab parties that would emerge as kingmakers in a new administration potentially led by former army chief Gadi Eisenkot, the leader of the Yashar party.

Notably, the alliance, which additionally includes the Hadash and Balad factions, has stated it could provide a so-called safety net to the anti-Netanyahu coalition by agreeing not to stand against it in a confidence vote, even if the alliance does not join the administration. In return, it has remarked it would demand certain conditions, including a path to Palestinian statehood and fighting organised crime.

As well as addressing discriminatory administration policies, including on housing, have additionally been the focus of Ra'am ahead of the election, combatting the wave of violent crime that has been allowed to engulf Palestinian communities.

Established in 1996, the party has already distanced itself from its religiously conservative foundations. In December 2025, Abbas remarked the party's political decision-making body would separate from its religious council. Eight months afterwards, it selected its electoral list independently for the first time and placed the Jewish Zionist Yoav Segalovitz, a former senior police commander and deputy public security minister in the Bennett-Lapid administration, second on its slate.

Describing Ra'am as "one of the most interesting parties" of this year's election, Mekelberg remarked: "Through Mansour Abbas, they are continually reinventing themselves without appearing opportunist."

In practice, the upcoming election is the first since the Hamas-led attack in southern Israel of October 7, 2023 that led to the killing of an estimated 1, 200 individuals, and triggered Israel's genocidal war on Gaza.

For context, the war has additionally sped up a political shift to the right, with Arab-led parties increasingly targeted by right-wing figures seeking to cast them as complicit in the October 7 assault.

While in September, Netanyahu's Likud and the Otzma Yehudi party of National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir petitioned to bar Ra'am and the Joint List from the election, in May, Bennett apologised for going into administration with Ra'am.

Balad leader Sami Abu Shehadeh was to be barred over an article he wrote on October 8, 2023 describing the Hamas-led attack of the previous day as an "important historic event". Ofer Cassif, a Jewish politician with Hadash, was targeted in a petition filed by Likud that cited legal prohibitions on candidates who backing "an armed struggle by an enemy state or terrorist organisation against the State of Israel".

As well as Cassif's, by a 7-2 majority, on October 2, the Supreme Court unanimously overturned the disqualifications of the Joint List and Ra'am. After it became clear the court was probable to uphold his disqualification, abu Shehadeh had withdrawn his candidacy a day earlier.

Speaking to Al Jazeera, Cassif afterwards called it "a political decision far more than a judicial one", driven by "fear that they're going to need us".

Orly Noy, a Balad candidate and the first Jewish politician to be voted onto the party list's top five, remarked it was "safe to say" that the alliance is not going to be part of the next ruling coalition.

"It depends if the other parties want to prioritise the wishes of their voters or their own racism. Nevertheless, even if we're excluded, we can still gain concessions from any coalition in return for our backing, " she continued. "That might not mean ending the occupation, which of course would be ideal, but there's a lot we can still do that will make people's lives better."

For context, the taint of October 7 has not only extended to Arab parties unconnected to the events of that day, but additionally to ultra-Orthodox Jewish parties.

While drawing heavily on what numerous regard as a generous state welfare package, as routine partners in Likud's governing coalitions, they have faced accusations by plenty of leading opponents of draft-dodging.

Israel's ultra-Orthodox community is largely represented by two parties: Shas. It draws on Jews of Spanish, North African and Middle Eastern descent; and United Torah Judaism (UTJ), comprising Jews of central and eastern European descent. Each is polling at regarding seven or eight seats.

Rather than focusing on foreign policy and taxation, their core intends tend to be shielding ultra-Orthodox students from military service, securing welfare backing for the sizeable families common in the community, where numerous men study rather than work, and protecting state funding for their schools and institutions.

Long seen as Netanyahu's most dependable allies, they broke with Likud last year over its failure to legislate an exemption to the draft. While Shas quit the administration but did not pull its 11 politicians out of the parliamentary coalition, the UTJ left the coalition altogether. Shas afterwards provided up its coalition committee roles, and both parties boycotted coalition bills.

Nevertheless, the backing of the ultra-Orthodox has come with a political rate tag. In January, opposition leader Yair Lapid accused the administration of sending billions "to the corrupt and draft dodgers" while another feasible contender for the premiership, the right-wing Avigdor Lieberman. This person heads the Yisrael Beytenu list, likened Shas and UTJ to the Taliban over their lack of female representation.

Taken together, the developments around the kingmakers who could determine Israel's election point to a situation that is still moving, and the coming days should bring more clarity.