Mansour Abbas Says Ra'am Needs Seven Seats to Enable Change Government Formation

Mansour Abbas, chairman of the United Arab List (Ra'am), outlined the conditions under which his party could become the kingmaker in the upcoming Israeli elections. Abbas stated that Ra'am's primary goal is to secure seven seats, which would allow it to facilitate the formation of a change government. In a Facebook post, Abbas identified two key conditions for Ra'am to play this pivotal role. The first is a message and action plan that would strengthen Ra'am's legitimacy and standing among both Arab and Jewish voters as part of a coalition. He claimed this condition has already been met, citing polls showing about 70 percent of opposition Jewish voters and over 70 percent of Arab voters support a change government including Ra'am.

The second condition is increasing Ra'am's parliamentary strength to seven seats in the upcoming elections, enabling it to act as the decisive factor. Abbas noted that right-wing coalition polls indicate a shortfall of 10 seats needed to form a government, while the change bloc, combined with Ra'am's seats, could reach 64-65 seats, enough to establish a coalition. Based on this, Abbas emphasized Ra'am's main objective is to secure at least seven seats to create a blocking coalition that would topple the right-wing government and prevent Netanyahu from undermining the change government after the elections.

Recently, talks between Ra'am and the other three Arab parties to form a joint Arab list failed, and Ra'am appears set to run independently in the upcoming elections.