Ra'am Candidate Criticizes Abu Shihadah's Election Candidacy

Yoav Segalovitch, who recently moved from the Yesh Atid party to the Ra'am party, stated on the 'All In' podcast that Sami Abu Shihadah has crossed a line and should not be allowed to run in the upcoming elections. Segalovitch believes Abu Shihadah himself understands this, quoting him as saying he wouldn't have acted as he did. However, Segalovitch expressed a general dislike for disqualifications.

Last week, the Central Elections Committee disqualified Sami Abu Shihadah from running for the Knesset due to problematic statements, most notably an article he wrote the day after the October 7th massacre. In the article, Abu Shihadah referred to the massacre as a "historic event" and mentioned the "surprise" Hamas prepared for the security forces. He suggested that if "little Gaza" could achieve such a thing, other countries might be capable of more.

When attempting to overturn the disqualification, Abu Shihadah claimed he did not yet grasp the full scope of the events and the massacre. Judge Solberg dismissed these as unacceptable excuses and unusually participated in the vote to disqualify Abu Shihadah.

Furthermore, it was revealed that three days after the massacre, Abu Shihadah posted a TikTok video that did not condemn the attack and did not mention Hamas as responsible.