When the Joint List, the Arab party that emerged as Israel’s third largest in the recent round of elections, endorsed Benny Gantz as its candidate for prime minister on Sunday, pundits took to every available perch to declare the moment historic. After all, no Arab party has ever endorsed a Jewish leader, and Ayman Odeh, the party’s Obama-esque leader, seized the moment properly by tweeting a line from Psalms. To many, this felt like a breath of fresh air, a surge of coexistence and compromise after Benjamin Netanyahu’s hard-line policies.

The hosannas, however, are premature: The Joint List, sadly, remains a vehemently anti-Zionist party whose members have often expressed their support for convicted terrorists. All it takes is a brief look at the party and its principles to learn why Gantz—whose Blue and White party is currently Israel’s most popular, with 33 Knesset seats—should immediately and forcefully reject this endorsement.
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That a party like the Joint List—which is fiercely anti-Zionist and advocates turning Israel from a Jewish state into a binational one—can emerge as the nation’s third largest is a testament to Israel’s robust and vibrant democracy, the very one perpetually eulogized by sophisticated columnists in liberal newspapers the world over. But there is only one thing Benny Gantz must now do with this endorsement, which is reject it vociferously and unequivocally. For all its rhetorical juggling and masterful use of social media, the party hasn’t changed its basic stance, one that calls for the destruction of Israel as it currently stands. Nor has it taken any steps to discipline its many members for cheering on terrorists and murderers. It should be denounced and ostracized, even—or particularly—in these uncertain political times.

That this joint list party is the third largest in Israel is not just “a testament to Israel’s robust and vibrant democracy,” – it’s an indicator of serious, serious problems in its social constituency.

In a break from custom, a coalition of Arab parties endorsed Gantz, marking the first time in nearly three decades that the group had recommended a candidate. Arab parties typically have withheld from endorsing a candidate because they have pushed back against any suggestion they were legitimizing Israeli policies, which they have claimed discriminated against Palestinians. Arab leaders said they made their decision with the goal of toppling Netanyahu.

Three Arab lawmakers said Monday they were withdrawing their endorsements for Gantz, which left him with less support than Netanyahu.

Mtanes Shehadeh, head of the Balad faction of the Joint List, confirmed to Haaretz on Monday that he had personally approached the director-general of President Reuven Rivlin’s bureau with the message that the faction objected to recommending Benny Gantz for prime minister. Balad wanted to make sure its members’ names were removed from the list of those who had given the Kahol Lavan leader their endorsement, Shehadeh said.
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Meanwhile, some sources in Balad suggested that their letter dissociating from the Gantz recommendation had been written with Tibi,Odeh and Kahol Lavan’s agreement, as Gantz’s party did not wish to be the first to be asked to form the government. But Odeh, Tibi and Kahol Lavan have denied any such collusion.
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Members of Hadash, another party in the Joint List, also objected to recommending Gantz to the president. MK Aida Touma-Sliman posted on Facebook: “This is Gantz’s fateful moment. Either he’s an alternative or he’s a Netanyahu double. We can’t be expected to recommend Gantz, after which he’ll rush to form a unity government. We demand a path that leads to a horizon that includes a hope for peace, justice, an end to the siege of Gaza, true equality, national and civil.”

Touma-Sliman’s remarks were also seen as directed against Odeh. But all party members of the Joint List alliance said they remain united despite these differences.

Odeh also wrote in a New York Times opinion piece explaining the decision: “I have argued earlier that if the center-left parties of Israel believe that Arab Palestinian citizens have a place in this country, they must accept that we have a place in its politics [. . .] We have decided to demonstrate that Arab Palestinian citizens can no longer be rejected or ignored. Our decision to recommend Mr. Gantz as the next prime minister without joining his expected national unity coalition government is a clear message that the only future for this country is a shared future, and there is no shared future without the full and equal participation of Arab Palestinian citizens.”
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Netanyahu said that “exactly what we’ve been warning of” has happened. “Now, there are two options: Either a minority government backed by those who reject Israel as a Jewish and democratic state and praise terrorists … would be formed, or a broad national unity government,” he said, vowing to “work as much as I can to form a broad national unity government. There’s no other solution.”

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-49790505

Ayman Odeh, leader of the Joint List, told President Rivlin that his alliance’s priority was to prevent Mr Netanyahu from serving another term.
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This is a significant exercise of political power by Israel’s Arab citizens.

President Rivlin is consulting party leaders about whom he should ask to lead the country after last week’s inconclusive election results. The Arab parties put in a strong showing, becoming the third largest force in the legislature.

Their support will not give Benny Gantz and his Blue and White alliance a majority, but it will give him a boost in negotiations about who gets the first chance to form a government.

The leader of the Arab grouping, Ayman Odeh, said it wasn’t endorsing Mr Gantz and his polices: but was moving to try and block Benjamin Netanyahu from securing another term, and to send a clear message that Israel’s future must include the full and equal participation of its Palestinian citizens.

https://libertyunyielding.com/2019/09/23/knessets-arab-bloc-endorses-benny-gantz-in-race-to-form-government/

The historic move marked the first time in nearly three decades that the Arab parties backed a candidate for prime minster, reflecting their contempt for Netanyahu, who was accused of fomenting hatred of the Arabs during his re-election campaign.

I can’t access the AP report quoted; here’s the Guardian.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/sep/22/israeli-arab-parties-back-benny-gantz-for-pm-breaking-with-precedent

In announcing the decision, Joint List leader Ayman Odeh said the alliance’s decision was not an endorsement of Gantz’s policies but a move to oust Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister.

It was the first time that majority Arab parties had endorsed a candidate for prime minister since 1992, when they backed Yitzhak Rabin, who went on to sign the Oslo accords with the Palestinians.

Netanyahu has repeatedly been accused of political rhetoric and actions amounting to racism toward Israel’s Arab population. “We have become illegitimate in Israeli politics in the Netanyahu era,” Odeh told Israeli president Reuven Rivlin when informing him of the endorsement. “We are this time recommending Benny Gantz to form the next government.”

Prominent Arab parliament member Ahmad Tibi said “history is done: We’ll do what is needed to bring down Netanyahu.”

But the success of the Arab parties’ mission to end Netanyahu’s long dominance of Israeli politics was far from certain.

If it is true as alleged, that all of the Arab parties support the dismantling of Israel and the destruction of the Jews, I’m not surprised Netanyahu took a stance opposing them. Whether that is racism or sanity appears to be in contention among the Middle East punditry.
As Ann said on the Ukraine story: whose spin are ya gonna believe? — because none of us, and likely no one else, knows the truth from the facts.

Lieberman, who could potentially play a king-maker role, said on Sunday that he would not endorse either Netanyahu or Gantz for now. He has insisted on a unity government between his party, Netanyahu’s rightwing Likud and Gantz’s centrist Blue and White.

He added that for the time being he could not back Netanyahu because the premier is willing to form a coalition with Israel’s ultra-Orthodox Jewish parties, which he accuses of seeking to impose religious law on the secular population.

Lieberman also said he could not back Gantz for now because he might reach a deal with either the ultra-Orthodox or Israel’s Arab parties, which he called “enemies”.

Given the choice between a more-orthodox religious regime that is at least of the same religion that Israel was founded to preserve (currently and anciently), and a regime dedicated to a religion that vehemently opposes that mission, I personally do not see how any Jewish Israeli can waffle over the point.

Yes, thanks. Some words went missing (haste/waste). I’ve made the additions.

Neo, seems to me you’re going to have to rewrite that. It doesn’t say what I believe you wanted to say.