Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits the Hatikva Market in Tel Aviv as part of the Likud party’s election campaign, October 22, 2026. (Avshalom Sassoni/Flash90)

50 shades of right: An Israeli election primer

While Netanyahu’s bloc adds more extremists to its ranks, his opponents are impeding their own path to power by refusing to work with Arab parties.
By Ben Reiff
Balad chairman Sami Abu Shehadeh, surrounded by MK Ahmad Tibi and Joint List chairman Yousef Jabareen, at the Supreme Court in Jerusalem for a hearing on the Central Elections Committee’s decision to disqualify candidates and parties from running in the upcoming Knesset elections, October 1, 2026. (Oren Ziv)

Israel’s election won’t change the renewed reality of political apartheid

Abu Shehadeh’s disqualification sends a clear message: Jewish-majority state institutions now determine who represents Palestinian citizens.
By Areej Sabbagh-Khoury
Election campaign billboards featuring Yashar party chairman Gadi Eisenkot and Likud party chairman and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu alongside opposition leaders, displayed on a road in the northern Israeli city of Haifa, October 17, 2026. (Sharon Leibel/Flash90)

Eisenkot is trying to outflank Netanyahu on the right. It’s a failed strategy

The more hawkish the opposition leader is, the harder it is to explain what alternative he offers — and he’s not the first to make that mistake.
By Amos Brison
Finance Minister and Religious Zionist Party chairman Bezalel Smotrich tours the Mahane Yehuda Market as part of the party’s election campaign, in Jerusalem, October 9, 2026. (Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)

Why Smotrich still defines the horizon of Israeli politics

Israeli liberals have acceded to the maximalist vision of the MK's 2017 ‘Decisive Plan’ — while claiming to oppose ‘messianic’ violence.
By Avi-ram Tzoreff
Leena Dallasheh (courtesy)
PODCAST

What’s at stake for Palestinian citizens in Israel’s election?

Leena Dallasheh discusses the echoes of military rule in today’s crackdown on Palestinian dissent, and the struggle for a more substantive form of citizenship.
By +972 Magazine
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The Jerusalem Gay Pride Parade, June 26, 2008. (Photo by Yotam Ronen/Activestills.org)
The cynical use of homophobia to attack the Joint List
The Pride Parade has become a litmus test of enlightenment for politicians. But clinging to that symbol is dangerous in that it disconnects the parade from its actual context — the LGBTQ community’s struggle for equal rights. By Inna Michaeli In a video question-and-answer segment produced by Haaretz this week, Arab actress and singer Mira…
By +972 Magazine March 12, 2015
Majda Bashir with three of her children, stand in the classroom where she stays with her family in the UNRWA al Mazra'a preparatory girls school, in the city of Deir al-Balah, eastern Gaza Strip, November 7, 2014. According to Majda, her family does not receive any food aid because the government was late to register the destruction of their home, preventing them to get on the list of beneficiaries. Several of her children suffer from malnutrition. Around 1,400 displaced Palestinians live in the school in very precarious conditions. Anne Paq/Activestills.org
WATCH: Bringing Gaza’s voices to Israeli voters
Elections are often imagined as a celebration of democracy. But what about those who have no vote to give? WATCH: Wake-up Call: 47 years of disenfranchisement
By Social TV March 12, 2015
Young activists at a protest against the Prawer Plan in the southern city of Hura, November 30, 2013. (Photo by Activestills.org)
A new activism, a new politics, a new generation of Palestinians in Israel
+972 sits down with four young, prominent, politically active Palestinian citizens of Israel to discuss their demands, how they are different than the generations that preceded them, and their hopes for the Joint List.
By Henriette Chacar March 11, 2015
Jewish immigrants from Yemen at a camp near Rosh Ha’ayin. (Photo: GPO)
Behind election lurks Israel’s ethnic divide
The use of racially loaded code words at an anti-Netanyahu rally highlights the inter-Jewish racism that has plagued Israeli society and politics since day one. A look at the correlation between ethnic background and voting patterns. The anti-Netanyahu rally in Tel Aviv Saturday night was meant to be a high point of the campaign to oust Israel’s…
By Dimi Reider March 11, 2015
Labor and Zionist Camp leader Isaac Herzog meets with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah. (File photo courtesy of Labor)
Poll: Israelis don’t believe either candidate will make peace
Six days before Israelis head to the polls, Prime Minister Netanyahu and his challengers, Herzog-Livni, are closer than ever. According to a new survey, most Israelis support a continued peace process, but don’t think it will succeed — regardless of who is at the helm. The past two-and-a-half months of campaigning leading up to next…
By Michael Schaeffer Omer-Man March 11, 2015
Passengers at Israel’s Ben-Gurion Airport (Photo by ChameleonsEye / Shutterstock.com)
High Court greenlights racial profiling at Israel’s airports
High Court rejects petition calling for an end to racial profiling against Arabs at Ben-Gurion Airport, yet refuses to make a principled ruling on the policy as a whole. Israel’s High Court of Justice rejected a petition by the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI), demanding an end to racial profiling at Ben-Gurion Airport on…
By Edo Konrad March 11, 2015
Israeli policemen enter the the Hayat family house in Silwan neighbourhood in East Jerusalem after Israeli settlers took over an apartment in the building, September 30, 2014. Israeli settlers took over seven homes in the Silwan neighborhood of East Jerusalem Tuesday morning.
JNF, settler group seek to evict Palestinian family in Silwan
The Jewish National Fund, known to Jews worldwide as an organization that plants trees in Israel, is once again trying to evict a Palestinian family from their home in East Jerusalem. By Moriel Rothman-Zecher Over the past few decades, the Jewish National Fund (JNF-KKL), an organization known to many in the diaspora for its work…
By +972 Magazine March 10, 2015
Hadash chairman Ayman Odeh at a press conference, February 11, 2015. (Photo by Activestills.org)
‘The Joint List isn’t turning its back on Israeli society’
As an oppressed and colonized minority, we will only ever achieve real change in Israeli policy when we behave as a coherent national group. This does not, however, mean we are excluding our Jewish allies. By Awad Abdelfattah The true strategic significance of the creation of the Joint Arab List has eluded most Israelis. Even…
By +972 Magazine March 10, 2015
Wake-up Call: 47 years of disenfranchisement
Did you know that in 15 out of Israel’s 20 elections one in three people living under Israeli rule haven’t had a vote? Ami Kaufman has a wake-up call for you. Click here for +972’s full coverage of Israeli elections
By Ami Kaufman March 9, 2015
A section of Israel's separation wall in the West Bank. (Activestills.org)
We’re not stuck with Palestinians, we’re stuck in our own fear
A group of ex-generals is warning Israelis that another Netanyahu-Bennett government will mean being stuck with the Palestinians forever. But no matter what happens, Israelis and Palestinians will always be stuck with each other. “With Bibi-Bennett, we’ll be stuck with the Palestinians forever.” I noticed a billboard carrying that slogan the other day and was…
By Mairav Zonszein March 9, 2015
Most Read
  1. 50 shades of right: An Israeli election primer
  2. ‘Lavender’: The AI machine directing Israel’s bombing spree in Gaza
  3. Israel's election won't change the renewed reality of political apartheid
  4. Jewish Israelis must do more than stand together with Palestinians
  5. Eisenkot is trying to outflank Netanyahu on the right. It’s a failed strategy
  1. ‘Lavender’: The AI machine directing Israel’s bombing spree in Gaza
  2. Days away from Israeli elections, a ‘sour mood’ pervades the Haredi street
  3. ‘We’ve paid the price for war. We haven’t yet reaped the fruits of peace’
  4. Jewish Israelis must do more than stand together with Palestinians
  5. Israel’s far right has unprecedented power. Why isn’t it satisfied?
  1. ‘Lavender’: The AI machine directing Israel’s bombing spree in Gaza
  2. Why ‘NAZA’ terrifies Israel's liberal elite
  3. Debunking Israel’s latest list of ‘terrorist’ journalists in Gaza
  4. ‘The Gaza Holocaust won't be forgotten’: An Israeli musician screams into the void
  5. ‘NAZA’ is forcing Israelis to reflect. But we Palestinians are not your mirror