Ra'am party leader backs two state solution in policy speech | Israeli election breakdown

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With two months remaining before Israel's parliamentary elections, the political campaign has intensified as alliances shift and parties vie for undecided voters. Current polls suggest that the opposition bloc is close to securing a 61-seat majority but may fall short, potentially necessitating support from the Arab Ra'am party to form a government. This scenario mirrors the dynamics of the 2021 election, yet it presents new complexities regarding the Palestinian state issue. While Ra'am leader Mansur Abbas has publicly endorsed the realization of a Palestinian state, other major Zionist leaders, including Gadi Eisenkot and Naftali Bennett, firmly reject this possibility. Support for a two-state solution among Israelis has dropped to historic lows following the October 7th attacks, leaving Ya'alon of the Democrats as the only major Zionist party leader currently advocating for such an arrangement. A significant controversy has emerged over campaign advertisements, particularly those from the ultra-Orthodox Shas party. Shas released a video depicting an Orthodox family waiting for a son returning from the army, which included a claim that 30,000 soldiers voted for them in the last election. The Central Elections Committee ordered the ad's removal, citing violations of electoral rules regarding the use of IDF imagery and the implication that the apolitical military supports Shas. Although Shas has historically opposed conscription for ultra-Orthodox Jews, critics argue this advertisement is a cynical public relations tactic designed to generate traffic and distract from internal party strife between its political and spiritual leaders. Analysts note that while voters may perceive the contradiction, the sheer volume of publicity ensures the message reaches the public regardless of official takedown orders. Beyond the ad controversy, the election landscape is influenced by high-profile endorsements and shifting societal currents. Jonathan Pollard, a former spy who spent decades in US prison for spying on Israel, has endorsed Sharon Pascal's new "Israel First" party, though the party currently polls below the threshold required for Knesset representation. Political analyst Attila Salva emphasizes that while surface-level issues like the draft and judicial reform remain central to the debate, underlying societal changes are occurring rapidly. He warns that daily polling data may not accurately reflect these deep-seated shifts, making it difficult to predict which parties will form coalitions before the votes are even cast. Ultimately, the path to forming a new government appears more complex than polls suggest, with both major Jewish blocs seemingly tied in the absence of Arab party support. The election is characterized by a fierce battle over issues such as the treatment of soldiers and the legacy of the current administration's three-year tenure. While Netanyahu attempts to highlight security achievements against threats from Iran, Lebanon, and Gaza, the opposition focuses on allegations that the government neglected its military personnel. As the news cycle accelerates and public sentiment evolves quickly, the final outcome will likely depend on how these parties navigate the tension between traditional political boundaries and the urgent issues facing Israeli society.

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With two months until Israel votes, the campaign is getting sharper by the day. And so are the controversial advertisements. From the fight over a future Palestinian state to the draft and who can build a 61 seat coalition. Correspondent Joe Brown has more on the latest political maneuvering. >> This week marks two months until the Israeli parliamentary elections. Alliances are being formed and broken. New parties are showing off their backing. And every politician is on the attack to get their slice of the undecided vote. Most of the latest polls have the opposition block close to a 61 seat majority, but falling a few seats short. It is becoming probable that just like they did in 2021, they may need help from the Arab Ram party. But that may be tricky. Ram leader Mansur Abbas told his party that a Palestinian state was becoming a reality. Gaddy Eisenkot, whose Yasha party is currently ahead in the polls, hit Bakat Abbabas, responding online by saying that a Palestinian state does not exist and will not exist under a coalition that he leads. Support for a Palestinian state is at a historic low among Israelis with a dramatic dip following the October 7th massacre where one poll from Pew Research said that 32% of Israelis believed a Palestinian state could live alongside an Israeli one. In 2025, that number had halved. Even in the last election in 2022, centrist Yeseshhated leader Ya Laid was calling for a two-state solution. Now, Ya Golan of the Democrats is the only leader of any major Zionist party who is calling for a two-state solution. Elsewhere, Ultra Orthodox Party Shasa's first electoral advert has also caught the eye of Yasha. >> You learned a lot this week, huh? For you and all of the soldiers. The advert shows an Orthodox Jewish family preparing for Friday night dinner, waiting for one of the sons to return from the army for the Sabbath. It ends with a contested claim that 30,000 soldiers in the last election voted for Shas. Yasha ordered the video to be taken down by 11:00 a.m. because they claimed that it broke electoral rules by using IDF soldiers and creating the idea that the apolitical army supports Shas. The chairman of the central elections committee, Noam Soulberg, agreed with Yashar and ordered Shass to remove the video. They also noted the hypocrisy of Shas, consistently voting against conscription for ultraorththodox Jews when the army is suffering from a personnel shortage. However, the apparent normalization of the army in an ultraorththodox family could suggest a new, more lenient view on her conscripts from shas and one of Israel's most internationally famous Orthodox Jews is entering the political arena. On October 7th, I saw that the entire country had been abandoned and betrayed. And this is why with you, I hope we will have a new government that's dedicated to the preservation of the land and people of Israel. Jonathan Pollard, who spent 30 years in a US prison for spying on Israel's behalf, has lent his support to the new Israel First party, led by former deputy foreign minister and former Liquid MK Sharon Pascal. He has been offered a spot on the list of farright parties in previous elections, but has turned them down. For the moment, this is just an endorsement, not a list placement. But even if it was, Palab might not be entering the Knesset just yet, as Israel first is currently polling well below the 3.25% 25% threshold needed for parliamentary representation. >> For more, we're joined now by political analyst Atila Salv, CEO of ASIS Strategic Consulting. Attilla, great to have you with us on i24 News. Listen, I have to say we might be heading into the 2026 election, but many of these arguments, they sound familiar from 2022. Now, you have Eisenote, you have Bennett, you have Netanyahu all rejecting a Palestinian state. And here you have Mansour Abbas openly backing one. What does this all mean for the coalition? Matt, if could still be needed to form a government. Yeah. Well, still we have the same problems here in Israel and everything was solved really and visav the ultra orthodox Jews that are not enrolling to the army and the judicial system that was not reformed as the government wanted and of course the opposition fighting its wars. So, so nothing changed. Even the slogans didn't change. Netawi is going with the same slogan uh trying to um you know to put together Eisen with the Arab party and show that he doesn't have a coalition without them which is by the way for now seems to be true because the numbers don't add up. Um but well the Israeli politics is is is a scene that have to be uh looked into very carefully because we we see the numbers and we we we see the polls and we're starting to form governments and coalitions before even the elections have happened. The problem is that here uh there there are under under currents you know uh that we can't really see and I feel that the PS that we are looking at on a daily basis almost do not reflect and represent the actual movements that you see in Israeli society and and Israeli society is changing very fast. I mean the news cycle is very fast. Everything is changing very fast. So we can be sure who's going to form the government and we can be sure who's the biggest party and we can be sure who's the next coalition. For now it seems both sides, the Jewish parts, I'm saying without the Arabs, they are at the tie, right? Nobody leads really uh this race. So it's going to be much more complex to form a government than than it looks right now. >> Yeah, certainly a lot can still happen in two months. I want to talk to you about this shas ad as well. They're running an ad that highlights the support for soldiers in conscripts despite repeatedly opposing this broader draft legislation. But I'm curious if a message like that can genuinely move undecided voters or can voters see the contradiction here? I mean, what's the point of even putting this out in the public? >> The point is having publicity. There's no publicity, right? That is bad. This is what the PR experts say. There is no bad publicity. You have to be taken into consideration. People have to talk about you. It's very cynical. It's a very cynical ad, but it also uh it's an ad that that creates a lot of traffic on on on the net. So, this is exactly what Shas wanted to say. They needed a bigger Elsewhere. As you can remember in the past few weeks, all we heard about Shas is the fight inside the leadership between Ary, the political leader and its hak who is the um you know the the the rabbi the chief rabbi and and the leader the spiritual leader of the party and and these guy these both gentlemen were at knives in the past few weeks. uh I I think Derry and and his strategist wanted to shift attention from from the inside fight that is bringing Shaz down because Shaz is around seven mandates in the polls in most of the polls I mean and and they wanted to shift the attention from from this fight from this uh uh bad mood that that has uh taken over in in Shaz party to something bigger and this is exactly what they did. We are all talking in the past few 24 hours exactly about this ad. I don't think anybody believes the chass who fought so hardly against enrolling uh um ultra orthodox uh young people to the army into the army really are behind the soldiers. I mean this is too cynical to be true. >> Well the central elections committee they did ask sh to take it down but this isn't the only party that they've had some >> it doesn't matter. Listen, it doesn't really matter. Let's be let's be fair with ourselves. We are living in the 21st century. Uh all the all the you know social media uh Instagram X uh once it's out there all the >> they all we chew it up right everybody knows about this. You you can't really take anything down these days. I mean it's it's it's out there. It's running in the groups WhatsApp, Telegram, everything. So, so it made it made exactly the effect they wanted to trust. >> Well, Eisenhot and Bennett, they also had to take down some campaign material that also featured soldiers. So, this is a theme that we're seeing across the different parties. Are they trying to push the boundaries further this cycle? No, >> it's not about boundaries. It's about the issues. Uh Natao doesn't want to talk about the the military, the soldiers, the the the the draft and so on. The opposition exactly, this is what it wants. The opposition wants to show that that this government left the the serving uh you know reserveists and the soldiers behind. So it's very important for the opposition to show that Netanyahu and his ultra religious uh you know partners they didn't care about the soldiers was fighting for the past few three years. Um and this is this is a fight on the issues >> right and and everybody wants to to make a point. Netanyahu is is is trying to show that what he did in the past three years is winning on so many fronts like for example Iran, Lebanon and Gaza in spite of the fact that even in these days uh we we we can see you know different kind of objects flying in from Gaza just in the past few year hours >> actually bringing us into our next topic. So I want to thank you so much for being with us and and to giving us some perspective inside the Israeli political sphere. Thank you. >> Thank you so much. Good evening.