Unlike their counterparts across much of the Middle East, Israeli Arabs exercise meaningful voting rights.

Israel’s 2.2 million Arabs, who comprise a fifth of the nation’s electorate, could decide who will serve as Israel’s next prime minister in the hotly contested election for the Knesset on October 27.

Meanwhile, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas announced he’s postponing legislative elections that were scheduled for November—and which he reassured the UN General Assembly he would hold—leaving Palestinians once again with no power to shape their own government.

Abbas has ruled the West Bank by decree since his four-year term ended in 2009, and he has not allowed legislative elections since 2006. Hamas, a genocidal terrorist group, has ruled Gaza since ousting the Palestinian Authority in a violent coup in 2007. Both the Palestinian Authority and Hamas govern in a harsh authoritarian fashion, brooking no dissent and permitting no challenge to their leadership.

The decades-long disenfranchisement of Palestinians is part of a larger regional story. Across the Middle East (other than in Israel), unelected strongmen rule with iron fists, allowing few political rights and civil liberties, or elected leaders use the tools at their disposal to undercut their nations’ democracies and expand their own power.

In essence, Israel’s Arabs have far more power to shape their government and far more freedom to voice their views than the more than 500 million people of Egypt, Iran, Turkey, Iraq, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, and other nations across the region.

It is a human rights problem that should attract far more attention from the United Nations and its affiliated bodies, from Western governments, and from the human rights community, were they not obsessed with the world’s only Jewish state.

To be clear, their obsession with Israel far predates Hamas’ slaughter of 1,200 Israeli men, women, and children on October 7, 2023, and the Israeli military response that also has drawn outsized global attention—compared to, say, Hamas’ original barbarism, Russia’s horrors in Ukraine, or the human suffering arising from the civil war in Sudan. 

At the UN, for instance, the General Assembly and Human Rights Council continue to condemn Israel far more frequently than any other nation, while the council lists Israel as its only permanent agenda item for each meeting while largely ignoring the human rights abuses of such nations as China, Pakistan, and Zimbabwe.

In its annual Freedom in the World report, the nonprofit Freedom House ranks nations as “free,” “partly free,” or “not free,” based on the political rights and civil liberties they offer their populations. On the report’s colored global map, Israel stands out as the only green (free) nation in a region dominated by purple (not free) nations (except for yellow, or partly free, Jordan and Lebanon).

No single political party has ever won at least 61 seats in the 120-member Knesset, nor will any on October 27, meaning Israel’s next government will again be a coalition of parties, headed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu or someone from the opposition.

Israel’s Arabs have the same rights as its Jews to vote, run for office, and form parties, and Arab-majority parties typically win 10–15 seats “when turnout is high.” Theoretically, those parties, which would very much like Netanyahu ousted, could give the opposition enough seats to reach a majority.

But (like Netanyahu) the opposition vows not to invite them to join. If, however, the opposition can’t put together a majority but has more seats than Netanyahu’s coalition, Knesset rules would allow it to govern. The Arab-majority parties could then help the governing coalition enact its agenda.

It is political power of the kind that other populations across the tumultuous Middle East can only dream of.

In Egypt, where President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi seized power in a 2013 coup, “meaningful political opposition is virtually nonexistent;” in Iran, “ultimate power” theoretically rests with the unelected supreme leader; in Turkey, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has grown “increasingly authoritarian over the past decade,” imprisoning political opponents, journalists, and members of civil society.

In Iraq, “democratic governance” is marred by corruption, government weakness, and outside militias; in Yemen, where “normal political activity” has ceased, civilians suffer from “violence and repression” by both the government and Houthi rebels; and in Saudi Arabia, an “absolute monarchy” under Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman restricts “almost all political rights and civil liberties.”

Will Netanyahu once again build a coalition large enough to keep him in office? Will the opposition overcome its internal conflicts and secure enough seats to oust him? In a supreme irony, it is Israel’s Arabs (Muslims, Christians, and others) who may tip the balance one way or the other.

It would be nice if other regional populations had such power to shape their governments. It also would be nice if the global community would divert its attention from Israel long enough to give this issue the focus it deserves.

About the Author: Lawrence Haas

Lawrence J. Haas is a senior fellow at the American Foreign Policy Council and the author of, among other books, Harry and Arthur: Truman, Vandenberg, and the Partnership That Created the Free World. Haas writes widely on foreign affairs, is quoted often in newspapers and magazines, and appears frequently on TV and radio. He previously served as communications director for Vice President Al Gore and, before that, for the Office of Management and Budget.

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