The Palestinian LGBTQ community isn’t used to being at the heart of their society’s most heated political debates. Yet in the months leading up to Israel’s fourth election in two years, queer Palestinians are now being pushed to center stage.
In an interview earlier this month that went viral on Arabic and Hebrew social media, Ahmad Tibi, one of the most prominent Palestinian members of Knesset, stated that he was against the promotion of what he called “the LGBTQ phenomenon.” His party Ta’al, he said, rejects any legislation that promotes LGBTQ rights, opposes pride marches, and believes LGBTQ individuals should not be allowed into classrooms to meet with schoolchildren as part of the curriculum.
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The three Arab parties remaining in the Joint List alliance present their electoral slates on February 4, 2021 (Credit: Joint List)
On Thursday night, the long-anticipated divorce between Mansour Abbas (Ra’am) and the Joint List’s other three parties became official.
“I don’t like to use the word ‘betrayal’” to describe Mansour Abbas’s break with the faction, Joint List chair Ayman Odeh said in an interview with Channel 13. He didn’t propose an alternative term, either.
The dissolution of the Joint List, which last March won the largest electoral showing in Arab Israeli political history an unprecedented 15 Knesset seats heralds the beginning of a hard political season for the Arab parties.
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Members of the Arab Joint list seen during a vote on a bill to dissolve the parliament, at the Knesset, in Jerusalem on December 12, 2019. Photo by Olivier Fitoussi/Flash90
Representatives of three of the four Arab parties which compose the Joint List said on Wednesday night that negotiations to maintain the unity of the bloc have failed, making it likely that they will not run together in the coming March elections.
“We’ve failed, unfortunately. The Joint List will not continue in its current lineup,” said Balad MK Mtanes Shehadeh, adding later: “At this point, we cannot continue as the Joint List because of our fundamental political differences.”