Ra'am Leader Mansour Abbas Publicly Calls for Palestinian State Recognition and Return to Israeli Coalition

In a national conference held in Tayibe, Mansour Abbas, chairman of the Ra'am party, publicly demanded that Israel and the United States recognize a Palestinian state and work toward ending what he terms the Israeli occupation. Abbas emphasized that a Palestinian state already exists and is recognized by most of the world except for Israel and the U.S. He expressed his party's desire to rejoin the Israeli governing coalition to regain political influence.

Abbas's statements come weeks after a Channel 14 investigative series titled "The Polite Jihad" revealed his nationalist Palestinian views behind a facade of civil discourse on budgets and equality. The investigation included recordings where Abbas referred to Israel as the "Zionist enemy," denied Jewish rights to the Temple Mount and Western Wall, described Hamas as "brothers," and called for the liberation of mosques and lands.

The report also exposed ideological ties between the southern branch of the Islamic Movement and the global Muslim Brotherhood, alongside financial and personal connections between Ra'am officials and Islamic Movement organizations linked to terrorist groups including Hamas. The investigation highlighted a strategy of cloaking nationalist aims in seemingly innocent civil struggles over budgets and cost of living to infiltrate Israeli decision-making centers and undermine the Jewish identity of the state from within.

Ra'am faction chairman Walid Taha added at the conference that the party is not content with mere demands but is actively working to impose political solutions. This stance gains significance ahead of the 2026 elections, where Ra'am could again hold the balance of power and potentially enable a left-wing government majority. Abbas stressed that Arab party participation in the coalition is now a serious political reality on the table.